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THE) 



GREAT ENGLISH WRITERS 



FROM 



CHAUCER to GEORGE ELIOT, 

WITH SELECTIONS 

ILLUSTRATING THEIR WORKS J 

A TEXT-BOOK OF ENGLISH LITERATURE FOR 
THE USE OF SCHOOLS. 



/BY 

TRUMAN J. BACKUS, LL.D., 

PRESIDENT OF PACKER COLLEGIATE INSTITUTE, BROOKLYN, 
AND 

HELEN DAWES BROWN, 

TEACHER OF ENGLISH LITERATURE IN THE BREARLEY SCHOOL, NEW YORK. 








SHELDON & COMPANY, 
NEW YORK AND CHICAGO. 

1889. 



THE SHELDON SERIE, 

EMBRACES; \ \./^>& 

SHELDONS' ELEMENTARY ARITHMETIC, 

SHELDONS' COMPLETE ARITHMETIC, 

SHELDONS' ELEMENTS OF ALGEBRA, 

SHELDONS' COMPLETE ALGEBRA. 

Part First of this book is the Elements of Algebra ; Part Second contains more difficult Test 

Examples ; General Demonstrations ; and such subjects as are usually 

embraced in more advanced Algebra.) 

SHELDONS' WORD STUDIES, 

SHELDONS MODERN SCHOOL READERS, 

SHELDONS' SUPPLEMENTARY READING. 



Copyright, 1889, by Sheldon &* Co. 



Blectrotypod by R. Harmer Smith <fe Sons, 82 Beekrnan St. New Tort. 



PREFACE. 



SHAW'S Complete Manual of English Literature, re- 
vised and rewritten by me, was published in 1875 
under the title, Shaiv's New History of English Lit- 
erature. It has been enlarged from time to time, and, 
with each succeeding edition, has been used by an in- 
creased number of my fellow-teachers. It has been praised 
unduly ; and, in some instances, it has been condemned 
unjustly. 

The criticisms most frequently and urgently offered 
have been that the authors discussed are too numerous, 
and that the literary style of the book is somewhat too 
mature for many of the students in whose hands it is 
placed. 

Accepting these criticisms, I have attempted to meet 
them — not by revision of the new History, but by making 
this text-book upon a new plan, discussing only those 
authors who are very prominent, and adapting the style 
and method of the book to students who are taking their 
first survey of the History of English Literature. 

My purpose to meet the demand for such a book has 
been long delayed. It might not have been fulfilled had 
I not fortunately secured the co-operation of Miss Helen 
Dawes Brown, whose success as a student and as a 



IV PEEFACE. 

teacher of the English Literature has been a source of 
satisfaction and pride to her former instructor. 

This volume contains extended selections from the writ- 
ings of the authors discussed. Concise editorial comments 
point out those literary characteristics of each author which 
are especially deserving of the student's attention. The 
selections have, in nearly every case, been reprinted from 
the English editions of best authority. The extracts from 
Shakespeare follow the text of W. J. Rolfe. The Claren- 
don Press Series has been used whenever it supplied the 
work quoted. 

It is the earnest hope of the authors that the selections 
may not be allowed to take the place of reading from the 
complete works of a writer. It cannot be too often said 
that the study of biography, criticism, and brief selections 
does not constitute a direct and personal knowledge of 
English literature. The object of this book is not to 
satisfy, but rather to stimulate the desire for such 
knowledge. 

TRUMAN J. BACKUS. 



The Packer Collegiate Institute, ) 



Brooklyn, N. Y., May 1, 1889. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

GEOFFREY CHAUCER 13 

CHAPTER II. 
EDMUND SPENSER 27 

CHAPTER III. 
THE RISE OF THE DRAMA 35 

CHAPTER IV. 
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE 45 

CHAPTER V. 
FRANCIS BACON 62 

CHAPTER VI. 
JOHN MILTON.... 71 

CHAPTER VII. 
JOHN BUNYAN 86 

CHAPTER VIII. 
JOHN DRYDEN 92 

CHAPTER IX. 
ALEXANDER POPE .. 102 



VI CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER X. 

PAGE 

JOSEPH ADDISON 112 

CHAPTER XI. 
JONATHAN SWIFT 123 

CHAPTER XII. 
DANIEL DEFOE 133 

CHAPTER XIII. 
SAMUEL JOHNSON 140 

CHAPTER XIV. 
EDMUND BURKE , 150 

CHAPTER XV. 
OLIVER GOLDSMITH 156 

CHAPTER XVI. 
EDWARD GIBBON 162 

CHAPTER XVII. 
ROBERT BURNS 169 

CHAPTER XVIII. 
WALTER SCOTT 177 

CHAPTER XIX. 
LORD BYRON 187 

CHAPTER XX. 
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH 197 

CHAPTER XXI. 
THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 207 

CHAPTER XXII. 
THE NOVELISTS 214 



CONTENTS. Vll 



SELECTIONS. 



PAGE 

CHAUCER 227 

SPENSER 236 

SHAKESPEARE, 240 

BACON 253 

MILTON 255 

BUNYAN 267 

DRYDEN 273 

POPE 283 

ADDISON 290 

SWIFT 295 

D EFO E 303 

JOHNSON 309 

BURKE 321 

GOLDSMITH 327 

GIBBON 336 

BURNS 339 

SCOTT 348 

BYRON 362 

WORDSWORTH 374 

MACAU LAY 382 

DICKENS 388 

THACKERAY 397 

GEORGE ELIOT 401 



A LIST OF BOOKS FOR THE LIBRARY. 



The school library should contain the following boohs : 

Selections from Chaucer, Clarendon Press Series. 

Selections from Spenser, Clarendon Press Series. 

Shakespeare's Richard III., Henry IV. (Part I.), Hamlet, King 
Lear, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The 
Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet, Much Ado About Nothing, 
Twelfth Night, As You Like It, and The Tempest,— edited by W. J. 
Rolfe, or by H. N. Hudson. 

Bacon's Essays. 

English Poems of Milton, Clarendon Press Series. 

Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. 

Selections from Dryden, Clarendon Press Series. 

Pope's Poems. 

The Spectator. 

Eighteenth Century Essays, edited by Austin Dobson. 

Swift's Gulliver's Travels. 

Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. 

Johnson's Lives of the Poets, edited by Matthew Arnold. 

Selections from Burke (Vol. I.), Clarendon Press Series. 

Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield. 

Goldsmith's Poems. 

Burns' Poems. 

Scott's Poems, Ivanhoe, The Talisman, Quentin Durward, Guy 
Mannering, Kenilworth, Rob Roy. 

Poems of Byron, edited by Matthew Arnold. 

Poems of Wordsworth, edited by Matthew Arnold. 



X LIST OF BOOKS FOR THE LIBRARY. 

Macaulay's Essays. 

Lives of Chaucer, Spenser, Bacon, Milton, Bunyan, Dryden, Pope, 
Addison, Swift, Defoe, Johnson, Burke, Goldsmith, Gibbon, Burns, 
Scott, Byron, Wordsworth, and Macaulay, in the "English Men of 
Letters " Series. 

Stopford A. Brooke's Milton. 

Boswell's Life of Johnson. 

Irving's Life of Goldsmith. 

Lowell's "Among My Books," and "My Study Windows." 

Whipple's Essays and Reviews, and Literature of the Age of 
Elizabeth. 

Leslie Stephen's Hours in a Library. 

Ward's English Poets. 
. Saintsbury's History of Elizabethan Literature. 

Gosse's Literature of the Eighteenth Century. 

Taine's History of English Literature, edited by John Fiske. 

Thackeray's English Humorists. 

Hudson's Life, Art and Characters of Shakespeare. 

Dowden's Mind and Art of Shakespeare. 

Dowden's Primer of Shakespeare. 

Mrs. Jameson's Characteristics of Women. 

Hazlitt's Characters of Shakespeare's Plays. 

J. R. Green's Short History of the English People. 

Bartlett's Familiar Quotations. 



Note.— Every pupil is advised to own the Rev. Stopford A. Brooke's Primer of 
English Literature, and to read carefully the sketch of each author mentioned in 
this text-hook. 



THE 



GREAT ENGLISH WRITERS. 



CHAPTER U 

GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 

(1340-1400.) 

"I consider Chaucer as a genial day in an English Spring."— 
Thomas Warton. 

" He had a very fine ear for the music of verse, and the tale and 
the verse go together like voice and music. Indeed, so softly flowing 
and bright are they, that to read them is like listening in a meadow 
full of sunshine to a clear stream rippling over its bed of pebbles." — 
Stopford Brooke. 

" If character may be divined from works, he was a good man, 
genial, sincere, hearty, temperate of mind, more wise, perhaps, for 
this world than the next, but thoroughly humane, and friendly with 
Grod and man." — Lowell. 

" O mayster dere and f adir reverent, 
My mayster Chaucer, floure of eloquence, 
Mirrour of fructuous endendement, 

universal fadir in science, 

Alas that thou thine excellent prudence, 

In thy bed mortel mighteste not bequethe ! 

What eyled Death? Alas! why would he sle the? " 

— Occleve. 
"He is the poet of the dawn, who wrote 
The Canterbury Tales, and his old age 
Made beautiful with song ; and as I read 

1 hear the crowing cock, I hear the note 
Of lark and linnet, and from every page 
Rise odors of ploughed field or flowery mead." 



14 CHAUCER. 

Writers before Chaucer. — Chaucer was the first great 
English poet. He began to write in the middle of the four- 
teenth century, and with that date, English literature, as 
it is known to the general reader, may be said to begin. 

Many men had been writing in England, however, before 
Chaucer lived. (1.) Some had written their books in 
Latin, which was in those early days the only language 
that learned men thought proper for the writing of really 
serious books. Such a writer was the Venerable Bede, a 
learned monk, who wrote an Ecclesiastical History of the 
English. (2.) After the Normans had conquered England, 
the gay French poets of the court wrote many songs and 
long tales in verse. But these writers of Latin and French 
have properly no place in English Literature. (3.) A third 
and far more important class were those who used the old 
English tongae, — the language that many people now call 
Anglo-Saxon. It is, however, only the old form of the 
very English that we speak to-day. In this ancient En- 
glish several important works were written, (a.) There is 
the epic poem that relates the exploits of Beowulf, a wild 
story of war and the sea, of storm and of fighting. (#.) 
There is the Bible history put into poetry by the monk 
Caedmon. (c. ) Good King Alfred wrote much in this old 
English ; among other things, a translation from the Latin 
of Bede's Ecclesiastical History. This book was most use- 
ful to his people as a history of their country, and has ever 
since been used by their historians as the basis of the 
earliest English history, (d.) Another work that is now 
of great value to the historian is the Saxon Chronicle. 
Some think that it was King Alfred who advised his 
people to keep this record. At all events, it began to 
be written in his reign. The Chronicle goes back to the 
landing of Julius Caesar in Britain, and proceeds with a 
dry, monotonous statement of the facts of English history. 
For example : 



CHAUCER. 15 

" 901. — This year died Alfred, the son of Ethelwulf, six nights be- 
fore the mass of All Saints. lie was king over all the English nation, 
except that part that was under the power of the Danes. He held the 
government one year and a half less than thirty winters ; and then 
Edward, his son, took to the government." 

Occasionally the record of kings and battles is interrupted 
by a song, just as in the Hebrew Chronicles occurs a song 
or a prayer after long genealogies or lists of rulers. 

From Alfred's time, the Chronicle was kept year by year 
in seven different monasteries, and was continued until the 
accession of Henry II., in 1154. 

Chaucer's Times. — The year 1340 is probably the date of 
Geoffrey Chaucer's birth, and 1400 is certainly the date of 
his death. The sixty years that he lived covered a most 
interesting period of English history. Many great changes 
were going on in social life. The feudal system was giving 
way, and people were gaining in freedom every day. En- 
glish and Normans were fighting together against the 
French, and from their pride in a common cause, became 
at last friendly and united. The victories of Crecy and 
Poitiers sent them home proud of themselves and their 
country. The nation was happy and prosperous, vigorous 
and active. Its activity took many forms. Men began to 
think for themselves, and to be eager to write and express 
their thoughts on. all sorts of subjects. (1.) One subject 
that they had much in mind was religion ; for the wisest 
men saw that the Christian Church had lost much of the 
pure and noble influence it was meant to wield. They 
boldly criticised the faults of their priests, as we see when 
we read Chaucer's Prologue. Chaucer denounced the bad 
men among the clergy, and John Wyclif dared even to 
reject doctrines of the Church. This was a hundred years 
before the Reformation, but Wyclif has been called the 
"first Protestant." (2.) People thought anxiously about 



16 CHAUCER. 

social problems, as they are doing in our own day. What 
was felt then about the relations of rich and poor may be 
seen by reading William Langlande's Vision of Piers 
Ploughman. (3. ) There was a movement toward greater 
political freedom. Parliament gained new powers. It dared 
to demand protection for the people against oppression by 
the Pope or by the King. (4. ) There was also great com- 
mercial progress. Towns and cities grew, manufactures 
spread, wealth increased. Such was the age of Chaucer — 
the age that is reflected in his writings. 

Life. — Geoffrey Chaucer was of good birth and breeding. 
We learn that, as a boy, he was a page in the household of 
a prince — the most fashionable training for a youth of that 
day. Whether he went to college or not is uncertain. In 
one of his poems he speaks of himself under the name and 
character of " Philogenet — of Cambridge — Clerk ; " but this 
should hardly be taken as proof that he was educated at 
Cambridge. We know that, when a young man, he served 
as a soldier in France, was taken prisoner, and ransomed. 
Chaucer was not only a man of letters, but also an active 
and public-spirited citizen and man of business. He held 
several public offices, and was especially useful to the king 
as an agent to foreign countries. Three times he was sent 
to Italy on public business. He was elected a member of 
Parliament in 1386 ; but in the political turmoil of that 
year, he lost all his offices. He was afterward appointed 
superintendent of royal buildings, and had charge of the 
repairs and building at the Palace of Westminster, the 
Tower, and St. George's Chapel, Windsor. Chaucer died 
in 1400, and was buried in Poets' Corner at Westminster 
Abbey. 

His Personal Appearance. — Chaucer has himself told us 
how he looked. In the prologue to The Rime of Sir 



CHAUCER. 17 

Tliopas, the host of the Tabard, himself represented as a 
" large man," and a " faire burgess," calls upon Chaucer in 
his turn to contribute a story to the amusement of the pil- 
grims, and rallies him on his corpulency, as well as on 
his absent-minded air : 

" What man art thou? " quod he ; 
" Thou lokest as thou woldest fynde an hare; 
For ever upon the ground I se the stare. 
Approche ner, and loke merrily. 
Now ware you, sires, and let this man have space. 
He in the wast is schape as well as I ; 
He semeth elvisch by his countenance, 
For unto no wight doth he daliaunce." 

A very old portrait of Chaucer is painted in one of the 
most valuable manuscript copies of his poems, and is prob- 
ably the work of his friend and fellow-poet, Occleve. This 
is the original of the picture with which we are acquainted. 
It shows him with a thoughtful, pleasant expression. He 
"semeth elvisch by his countenance," and wears the same 
shy, half-mischievous look that the host detected in his 
face. 

His Literary Career. — When Chaucer began to write, the 
English literature imitated the French. France had set 
the fashion of long narratives in rhyme, which often took 
the form of dreams, visions, and allegories. Chaucer fol- 
lowed the lead of other poets. He caught the infection 
of allegory, and many of his poems, such as The Court 
of Love, The Assembly of Fowls, TJie Flower and the 
Leaf, and The House of Fame, are allegorical. The great 
event of Chaucer's literary career was his visit to Italy, 
where he learned to admire Italian literature. The tradi- 
tion is that he met Petrarch, "whose rethorique sweete 
enlumyned al Itail of poetrie," and who, so Chaucer tells, 
related to him the story of Patient GJ-riselda. He read 



18 CHAUCER. 

Boccaccio, and learned mnch from him about the art of 
story-telling. Chaucer returned to England with the in- 
tention of writing a book of tales like the Decameron of 
Boccaccio. For many years he carried this purpose in his 
mind, writing at intervals stories comic, pathetic, or ro- 
mantic, which were finally gathered together, and formed 
Tlie Canterbury Tales. The work grew much as Tenny- 
son's Idyls of the King have grown from year to year. 

Chaucer may have used the form of French allegory, or 
the plan of Italian story-tellers ; but when his first youth 
was over, he became a thoroughly English writer. For 
instance, in the BoJce of the Duchesse, which follows the 
French device of a dream, there occurs this life-like picture 
of a young English girl : 

" I sawgh hir daunce so comelely, 
Carole and synge so swetely, 
Lawghe and pleye so womanly, 
And loke so debonairly ; 
So goodely speke and so f rendly ; 
That certes Y trowe that evermore, 
Nas seyne so blysful a tresore. 
For every heer upon hir hede, 
Soth to seyne, hyt was not rede, 
Ne nouther yelowe, "ne broune hyt nas ; 
Me thoghte most lyke gold hyt was. 
And which eyen my lady hadde ! 
Debonaire, goode, glade, and sadde, 
Symple, of goode mochel, noght to wyde. 
Therto hir looke was not asyde, 
Ne overthwert." 

For the plan of The Canterbury Tales Chaucer may have 
received a hint from Boccaccio, but there is not in our lit- 
erature a more hearty English work. In saying that 
Chaucer was thoroughly English, we- must remember that 
he also knew other countries well, that he had a broad, 
open mind, and great adaptability. 



CHAUCER. 19 

The Canterbury Tales is Chaucer's greatest work. The 
plan, though simple, is admirable, since it enables the poet 
to bring together a great variety of men and women, and 
to make each tell a story suited to his character. The plan 
is laid before us in the Prologue. The poet tells us that, 
being about to make a pilgrimage from London to the 
shrine of Thomas a Becket in the Cathedral of Canterbury, 
he passes the night previous to his departure at the Tabard 
Inn in South wark. While at the "hostelrie" he meets 
many pilgrims bound to the same destination : — 

" In Southwerk at the Tabard as I lay, 
Redy to wen den on my pilgrimage 
To Caunterbury with ful devout corage, 
At night was come into that hostelrie 
Wei nyne and twenty in a compainye 
Of sondry folk, by aventure i-falle 
In felaweschipe, and pilgryms were thei alle, 
That toward Caunterbury wolden ryde." 

This goodly company, assembled in a manner so natural 
in those times of pilgrimages and of difficult and dangerous 
roads, agree to travel in a body ; and at supper Harry Bailey, 
the host of the Tabard, a jolly and sociable fellow, proposes 
to accompany the party as a guide, and suggests that they 
may enliven the tedium of their journey by relating stories 
as they ride. He is accepted by the company as leader, by 
whose decision every one is to abide. The jovial guide pro- 
poses that each pilgrim shall relate two tales on the journey 
out, and two more on the way home ; and that, on the re- 
turn of the party to London, he who shall have related the 
best story, shall sup at the common cost. Such is the 
general plan of the poem. In the description of man- 
ners, persons, dress, and outfit, with which the poet has 
introduced his stories, we behold a vast portrait gallery of 
English society in the fourteenth century. These wonder- 
ful character sketches will repay careful study. There is 



20 CHAUCER. 

the portrait of the Prioress, the fine lady of Chaucer's day. 
She is at the head of a fashionable convent, and is attended 
by a nun and three priests. There is the Knight, Chaucer's 
ideal gentleman — 

" That from the tyme that he first bigan 
To ryden out, he lovede chyvalrye, 
Trouthe and honour, fredom and curteisie " 

With the knight rides a young squire, the "swell" of the 
fourteenth century, — 

" Embrowded was he, as it were a mede, 
Al ful of fresshe floures, white and reede. 
Syngynge he was, or flotynge, al the day ; 
He was as fressh as is the moneth of May. 
He cowde songes make and wel endite, 
Juste and eek daunce, and wel purtreye and write." 

Chaucer introduces to us a monk and a friar who are no 
credit to the Church ; but to offset their worldliness, he 
creates the noble and beautiful character of the Parson : — 

" A good man was ther of religioun, 
And was a poure Persoun of a toun; 
But riche he was of holy thought and werk." 

The doctor, the merchant, and the lawyer, are not 
omitted. Even the cook, the carpenter, the miller, and 
the sailor, are there. The Canterbury Tales thus becomes 
a work of great historical as well as literary value. No 
fewer than thirty-two persons went on this famous pilgrim- 
age, and if each of them had related two tales on the 
journey to Canterbury, and two on the return, the work 
would have contained one hundred and twenty-eight stories. 
This plan was never carried out. The stories that we pos- 
sess are but twenty-five in number ; for several of the pil- 
grims never speak at all, and the " merie companye " never 
reaches Canterbury in Chaucer's pages. The stories are 



CHAUCER. 21 

linked together by what the author calls prologues, consist- 
ing of remarks and criticisms on the preceding tale, and 
of the incidents of the journey. Chaucer's characters are 
never more life-like than in these dramatia links between 
his stories. 

The stories themselves were seldom invented by Chaucer. 
He borrowed as freely as he pleased from old French poets 
or Italian story-tellers. But, says Lowell, if a man dis- 
cover the art of transmuting lead into gold, shall we in- 
quire too carefully whether he steals his lead ? 

There is great variety among the stories, as there was 
great variety among the people who told them. Every 
kind of story known to Chaucer's day may be found in The 
Canterbury Tales. There is the romance related by the 
knight ; the Prioress' legend of " Litel Hew of Lincoln/' 
the child who was cruelly slain for singing his hymn to 
the Virgin ; there is the coarse story of common life, as 
the miller's tale ; there is the allegory, in the long prose 
tale of Melibeus ; and the fable, in the story of the Cock, 
told by one of the priests who attended the Prioress. The 
Clerk of Oxenford relates the pathetic tale of Patient 
Griselda, the most touching and beautiful of Chaucer's 
stories (p. 228). 

Of all the Canterbury pilgrims only two addressed the 
company in prose. One was the worthy parson, who took 
the opportunity to preach a long sermon on the seven 
deadly sins. It is dull enough, but it has an historical in- 
terest as a specimen of the sermons to which Chaucer and 
his contemporaries were obliged to listen. 

Chaucer's Character. — Chaucer was clearly a man re- 
spected and trusted by the community, a faithful and com- 
petent public servant. From his writings we can learn still 
more about his mind and character. TJie Canterbury Tales 
tell us of his democratic spirit. Says Chaucer : — 



22 CHAUCEE. 

1 ' Lok who that is most virtuous alway, 
Prive and pert, and most entendith ay 
To do the gentil dedes that he can, 
Tak him for the grettest gentilman. 
Christ wol we clayme of him oure gentilesse, 
Nought of oure eldres for her olde richesse." 

We learn from Chaucer's writings how broad and human 
were his sympathies, and how deep was his knowledge of 
men. He looked at them with a singularly even temper 
and clear judgment. No fault or folly escapes his keen eye, 
but his reproof is always kindly and genial. He loved his 
fellow-men ; but his character was so well rounded that he 
loved books and solitude besides. 

" On bokes for to rede I me delyte, 
And to hem give I feyth and ful credence, 
And in niyn herte have hem in reverence, 
So hertely, that ther is game noon, 
That fro my bokes maketh me to goon, 
But yt be seldom on the holy day, 
Save, certeynly, when that the monethe of May 
Is comen, and that I here the foules synge, 
And that the floures gynnen for to sprynge, 
Farewel my boke, and my devocioun ! " 

Chaucer loved nature, as we might guess from those fresh 
spring verses with which The Canterbury Tales begin. 

Chaucer's humor is delightful. Nothing was lost on his 
sensitive nature : he was quickly touched by the humorous 
or by the pathetic side of life and character. Nothing can 
surpass his gentleness and tenderness in such a tale as that 
of Little Hugh ; or his sly, delicate humor in the portrait 
of the Prioress ; or, again, the boisterous fun of some of his 
comic tales. We feel that these traits of the writer were 
undoubtedly qualities of Chaucer the man, — that he was 
broad, charitable, human, that he was shrewd, observant, 
and thoughtful, that he was tender and pitiful, and yet 
full of the best kind of fun. 



CHAUCER. 23 

Chaucer's English. — Chaucer occupies an important place 
in the history of the English language. Our language was 
brought into England from the continent by the Teutonic 
tribes who conquered Britain in the fifth century. The 
Normans, in their turn, conquered the country in 1066, 
and settled in England in large numbers. The two lan- 
guages, Norman and Saxon, received a great shock when 
they came together. The first effect was to drive them 
apart. The new-comers were the royal family, the nobility, 
the clergy, and the army ; there was among them no mass 
of common people whose station would compel them to 
mingle with the conquered Saxons. The nobility used the 
Norman speech, and continued to use their influence in its 
favor until the fourteenth century. No attempt was made 
to force the French language upon the Saxons ; but the two 
races did not seek each other's companionship, — as chil- 
dren would say, they " did not speak to each other." This 
mutual dislike lasted for a century ; then followed a hun- 
dred years of apparent indifference ; but in the third cent- 
ury after the Conquest, the dislike was beginning to wear 
away, and at last all classes of people were united by 
their common interest in the foreign wars of England. 
When Normans and Saxons fought together against the 
French, they became Englishmen. Their languages be- 
gan to blend with the same friendliness in which they 
themselves now associated. Old English, influenced by 
French, underwent many changes. Saxon words, as pro- 
nounced or written by the Normans, were often contracted 
in pronunciation or spelling ; more important still, the 
old English lost the greater part of its inflections ; and per- 
haps most important result of all, a large number of 
French words was introduced, and the way was "thus opened 
for the entrance of foreign words into the language. This 
ready adoption of words from foreign sources has been from 
that day a striking characteristic of the English tongue. 



24 CHAUCER. 

Some critics maintain that it makes an unscholarly mixt- 
ure of contributions from all nations ; others say that it 
gives us the richest and most flexible of modern languages. 

In the fourteenth century, when these great changes 
were going on, Chaucer began to write. It is a matter of 
no small importance to us that he lent the influence of his 
writings to the strengthening and establishing of the En- 
glish language in its new form. From the Norman Con- 
quest until the time of Chaucer, the Latin had been used 
in England by those who wrote for the learned ; the 
French was the language of fashionable literature, and the 
English was written only for the ignorant. But Chaucer 
saw in the English tongue strong, fresh, original material 
for his literary art. "Let clerks [scholars] indite in 
Latin, " he says in the Testament of Love, "and the 
Frenchmen in their French also indite their quaint terms, 
for it is kindly to their mouths ; and let us show our fan- 
tasies in such words as we learned of our mother's tongue. " 
His follower, Occleve, called him "the firste fynder of our 
faire langage." So popular a writer did much to fix the 
English speech. The readers of his poetry fell naturally 
into its language, and Chaucer became a model, a stand- 
ard, — that is, a classic. 

The difficulty of reading and understanding his writings 
has been much exaggerated. The pupil will discover that 
the more knowledge of French and German he possesses, 
the easier will he find The Canterbury Tales. In the 
fourteenth century, the Norman and Saxon elements in 
our language were much less closely blended than now : 
the Saxon words were more like their kindred German 
words, while the Norman were more like French. The 
student should keep in mind that the Norman words in 
Chaucer's writings, not having yet become thoroughly En- 
glish, are therefore to be read with their French accent. 



CHAUCER. 25 

He should remember that final e is usually to be pronounced 
as a separate syllable, when the word following does not be- 
gin with a vowel or with the letter h ; and, finally, that the 
termination of the verb, ed, is to be made a separate sylla- 
ble. If the pupil will commit to memory the following 
lines according to the metrical division, he will find little 
further difficulty in pronouncing Chaucer rhythmically. 

"Whan that | April | ]e with | his schow | res swoote, 
The drought | of Marche | hath per | ced to | the roote, 
And ba | thed eve | ry veyne | in swich | licour, 
Of which 1 vertue j engen | dred is | the flour ; 
Whan Ze | phirus | eek with | his swe | te breethe, 
Enspi | red hath | in eve | ry holte | and heethe 
The ten | dre crop | pes, and | the yon | ge sonne 
Hath in j the Ram | his hal | fe cours | ironne, 
And sma | le fow | les ma | ken me | lodie, 
That sle j pen al | the night | with o | pen eye, 
So pri | keth hem | nature | in here | corages : — 
Tharme Jon J gen folk | to gon | on pil | grimages." 

Chaucer's Influence on English poetry has been very 
great. All the poets of his own time admired and imitated 
him. Grower, in one of his poems, makes Love say of 
Chaucer : 

' ' Of ditties and of songes glad, 
The which he for my sake made, 
The land fulfilled is over all." 

Occleve bewails the death of his "mayster dere and fadir 
reverent, mayster Chaucer, floure of eloquence/ - ' Lydgate, 
a voluminous narrative poet, refers to his " maister Chau- 
cer," "the lodesterre of our language.'' When we reach the 
Elizabethan age, we find Spenser looking back to Chaucer 
for his inspiration. He calls him a "well of English unde- 
fyled," and adopts his language as well as his spirit. 
Milton pays a tribute to him in 11 Penseroso. The un- 



26 CHAUCER. 

poetical age of Queen Anne saw little beauty in Chaucer. 
Addison wrote : 

" But age has rusted what the poet writ, 
Worn out his language, and obscured his wit." 

In our later time there has arisen a new interest in 
Chaucer. With such writers as Burns and Wordsworth, 
we return to the spirit of Chaucer, and to the spring-time 
of English poetry. 

Suggestions for Reading. — The Prologue of The Canterbury 
Tales, — The ClerTces Tale, — The Nonne Prestes Tale, — The Prioresses 
Tale, in the Clarendon Press Series ; — Chaucer {English Men of Let- 
ters), Chapters I. and III. ; — Ward's English Poets, — Essay on Chau- 
cer ; — Selections from Lowell's Essay on Chaucer. 



In this chapter we have considered ; — 

1. Writers before Chaucer. 

2. Chaucer's Times. 

3. Sis Life. 

4. His Personal Appearance. 

5. Sis Literary Career. 

6. The Canterbury Tales. 

7. Chaucer's Cliaracter. 

8. Chaucer's English. 

9. Chaucer's Influence. 



CHAPTEH iU 



EDMUND SPENSER. 

(1553-1599.) 

" The poets' poet." — Charles Lamb. 

" Our sage and serious Spenser." — Milton. 

" Of all the poets, he is the most poetical." — Hazlitt. 

' ' Old Spenser next, warmed with poetic rage, 
In ancient tales amused a barbarous age; 
An age that yet uncultivate and rude, 
Where'er the poet's fancy led, pursued. 

But now the mystic tale, that pleased of yore, 

Can charm an understanding age no more." — Addison. 

" The true use of him is as a gallery of pictures which we visit as 
the mood takes us, and where we spend an hour or two at a time, long 
enough to sweeten our perceptions, not so long as to cloy them. He 
makes one think always of Yenice ; for not only is his style Venetian, 
but as the gallery there is housed in the shell of an abandoned con- 
vent, so his in that of a deserted allegory. " — Lowell. 

" To the most high, mightie, and magnificent Bmperesse, renowned 
for pietie, vertue, and all gratious government, Elizabeth, by the grace 
of God Queene of England, Fraunce, and Ireland, and of Virginia, 
Defender of the Faith, etc., her most humble servaunt, Edmund Spen- 
ser, doth in all humilitie dedicate, present, and consecrate these his 
labours to live with the eternitie of her fame." — Dedication of The 
Faerie Queene. 

Spenser's Times. — The first great expression of the 
English mind in literature ended with the death of Chau- 
cer. There followed a period of one hundred and fifty 
years in which not one man of literary genius appeared. 
From 1400 to the Elizabethan age, English literature has 



28 SPBNSEB. 

little interest for us. (1.) The introduction of printing 
into England by William Caxton, in 1474, was an event 
of importance in helping to prepare the way for the 
second period of literary activity. (2.) The revival of the 
ancient Greek learning, which had begun in Italy, became 
in England, too, the source of new thought and intellectual 
energy. Till they began to study the ancient literatures, 
the English people had no models but the Italian and the 
French. Now they found books great in thought and noble 
in form, which gave them an entirely new inspiration. 
(a.) Among the scholars associated with this New Learning, 
as it was called, was Eoger Ascham, the tutor of Queen 
Elizabeth and Lady Jane Grey. He wrote a valuable book 
about teaching, called The /Schoolmaster . (b.) A second 
famous scholar was Sir Thomas More, who wrote in Latin 
a description of an ideal country, where social and political 
usages had reached a state of perfection. We derive from 
the title, Utopia, our adjective Utopian, (p.) Still an- 
other famous classical scholar was William Tyndale, who 
was the first to make a translation of the New Testament 
into English, directly from the Greek. The English Bible 
that Wyclif had given to the people had been a trans- 
lation from a Latin version of the Greek and Hebrew 
original. . 

Intellect had been slumbering for nearly two centuries. 
It awoke now with freshness and vigor. There was no 
limit to the new interests that the world offered at that 
moment to the minds of men. Voyages to distant lands 
across the Atlantic stimulated the curiosity and imagina- 
tion of the Englishman ; classic learning roused his schol- 
arly and literary instincts ; the great questions of the 
Reformation filled his thoughts. Moreover, nothing that 
related to his every-day life was indifferent to him ; his 
dress, his house, and his furniture, received new attention. 
Life was found to be well worth enjoying, and people set 



SPENSER. 29 

themselves about making the world a pleasanter place to 
live in. Such was England when Spenser wrote The 
Faerie Queene. 

Life of Spenser. — The great English poet who follows 
next after Chaucer is Edmund Spenser. He was born in 
London about 1553. We know little of his youth, except 
that he was poor, and that he loved books. Spenser went 
to the University of Cambridge, and his writings make 
us sure that he was an apt and appreciative student. On 
leaving college, he spent two years in the north of England, 
where he fell in love with a "fair widowers daughter of the 
glen." The young lady, whom he called Kosalind, did not 
return his affection, and he was driven for solace to writ- 
ing Tlie Shepherd's Calendar. Spenser's college friend, 
Gabriel Harvey, wished to do his old companion a good 
turn, and persuaded Spenser to come to London, where 
Harvey introduced him to the powerful Earl of Leicester, 
and to Sir Philip Sidney. Sidney was himself a writer, but 
it has been his charm and nobility of character rather than 
his writings that have endeared him to the world. He was 
scholarly in his tastes, and magnanimous and heroic in 
spirit. His own lofty character may be best described by 
his definition of the gentleman : the man of "high-erected 
thoughts seated in a heart of courtesy." Sidney welcomed 
Spenser to his house, treated him with the utmost kindness, 
and cheered him on in his literary ambition. Spenser re- 
vised his Shepherd's Calendar, and dedicated it to " Mais- 
ter Philip Sidney, worthy of all titles, both of chivalry and 
poesy." He was anxious to win the patronage of some 
great person who would enable him to devote his life to 
literary pursuits. Whoever desired to be a writer in those 
days, if he were a poor man, must secure the patronage of 
wealth. Spenser's object was well-nigh accomplished when 
Sidney and Leicester became his friends. They soon 



30 SPEKSER, 

brought him to the notice of the Queen. To her he paid 
his literary homage, gaining her applause, and receiving a 
government office in Ireland in 1580. 

During the remaining eighteen years of his life, Spen- 
ser's home was in Ireland. In 1586 he received a grant of 
three thousand acres of land, with Kilcolman Castle for 
his residence. He lived in the southern part of the coun- 
try, surrounded by beautiful scenery and in the quiet and 
seclusion that were necessary for the writing of a great 
imaginative poem. His position in Ireland was, however, 
an unhappy one. The peasantry bitterly hated an English- 
man who came, as he did, to represent the English govern- 
ment ; and he, in turn, had no love for the Irish. He 
wrote, in prose, a View of the State of Ireland; and a 
very gloomy view it was. 

" They say, it is the fatall desteny of that land, that noe purposes, 
whatsoever are meant for her good, will prosper or take good effect, 
which, whether it proceede from the very Genius of the soyle, or 
influence of the starres, or that Almighty God hath not yet appoynted 
the time of her reformation, or that He reserveth her in this unquiett 
state still for some secrett scourdge, which shall by her come unto 
England, it is hard to be knowen, but yet much to be feared." 

Sir Walter Raleigh was another powerful friend of Spen- 
ser, and occasionally visited him in Ireland. It was during 
one of these visits at Kilcolman Castle, that Spenser read 
to his guest the first three books of The Faerie Queene. 
Raleigh was delighted with the work, and insisted on 
Spenser's bringing it to England for immediate publication. 
The poem appeared in 1590, and was read with eager 
pleasure by all England. Hallam says, " The Faerie 
Queene became at once the delight of every accomplished 
gentleman, the model of every poet, the solace of every 
scholar." 

Spenser's exile came to a tragic end. In 1598 Tyrone's 
Rebellion broke out in the southern part of Ireland. En- 



SPEKSEE. 31 

glish residents could look for no mercy from the rebels. 
Spenser was specially disliked by them. His castle was 
attacked and burned, and his infant child perished in the 
flames. Overwhelmed by his misfortune and his grief, the 
poet hastened to London, where he died in January, 1599. 
There was great pomp at his funeral. " Poets attended 
upon his hearse, and mournful elegies, with the pens that 
wrote them, were thrown into his tomb/' He was buried 
in Westminster Abbey, near the grave of Chaucer. 

Character. — Spenser was a dreamy, imaginative man, 
who lived much in his own thoughts. Like his poetry, he 
was gentle and pensive, never ardent or impassioned. No 
one can read Spenser, however, without knowing him to 
be a noble and high-minded man, of deep religious feeling. 
He was like the Puritans in his love for purity of character, 
while he was very unlike them in his love of beautiful 
things. 

The Shepherd's Calendar. — Spenser's first fame was 
gained by the publication of The Shepherd's Calendar. 
This work is a series of twelve pastoral poems, one for each 
month, in which, as in Virgil's Bucolics, the imaginary 
talkers discuss moral and political questions. The glimpses 
of English scenery are often pretty ; while the descriptions 
of the months make it a suitable calendar for a poet. Here 
is June : — 

"The simple air, the gentle warbling wind, 
So calm, so cool, as nowhere else I find ; 

The grassy ground with dainty daisies dight, 
The bramble bush, where birds of every kind 

To the waters' fall their tunes attemper right." 

On the whole, however, The Shepherd's Calendar is dull 
reading, and we should have heard little of Spenser if he 
had written nothing else. 



32 SPENSER. 

The Faerie Queene was the great work of Spenser's life. 
(1.) The poet explained his purpose in a letter prefixed, to 
The Faerie Queene. 

' ' To the right noble and valorous Sir Walter Raleigh, Knight. 

"Sir, knowing how doubtfully all Allegories may be construed, 
and this booke of mine, which I have entituled The Faerie Queene, 
being a continued Allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good, as 
well for avoyding of jealous opinions and misconstructions, as also 
for your better light in reading thereof, to discover unto you the gen- 
erall intention and meaning, which in the whole course thereof I have 
fashioned. The generall end therefore of all the booke is to fashion 
a gentleman or noble person in virtuous and gentle discipline. Which 
for that I conceived shoulde be most plausible and pleasing, beeing 
coloured with an historicall fiction, the which the most part of men 
delight to read, rather for variety of matter than for profite of the 
ensample, I chose the historye of King Arthure, as most fitte for the 
excellency of his person, beeing made famous by many mens former 
workes, and also furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of 

present time I labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he 

was king, the image of a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private 
Morall Vertues, as Aristotle hath devised." 

And so Spenser goes on, "expounding his whole inten- 
tion in the course of this worke." "This much, Sir," he 
concludes, "I have briefly overronne to direct your under- 
standing to the wel-head of the history." Spenser had a 
lofty moral purpose. Beauty of character was as precious 
to him as the beauty of a poem, a face, or a landscape : 
and in writing The Faerie Queene, he set himself to make 
adiero of ideal moral beauty. 

(2.) Like The Canterbury Tales, TJie Faerie Queene was 
never completed. Signs of fatigue appear long before we 
reach the end of the poem in its present form, and it is not 
to be regretted that it remains unfinished. To read the 
poem with pleasure, we should give ourselves little anxiety 
about the allegory or the moral. "Let the reader," says 
Professor Child, "not trouble himself, therefore, about its 
architecture, and seek to reduce it to rules of symmetry, or 



SPENSER. 33 

to any other rules save those of a castle in the air. Let 
him not concern himself about the allegory, which was 
dark enough two hundred and fifty years ago, and has 

since become in many places impenetrable Let 

him pass over what he does not like. Spenser will never 
be read at all, if he is to be diligently perused like the 
standard histories/' 

To enjoy The Faerie Queene, it is also quite as well not 
to try to follow the story too closely. Spenser did not suc- 
ceed in carrying out a complicated plan. The poem rambles 
over vast fields of knowledge and fancy, one digression lead- 
ing on to another, till we are farther and farther away from 
our starting-place, and no nearer to our destination. TJie 
Faerie Queene annoys an orderly or a hurried reader. He 
calls the work tedious and diffuse, bewildering and unintel- 
ligible. " ' Much depends/ says Charles Lamb, ' upon token 
and where you read a book. In the five or six impatient 
minutes before the dinner is quite ready, who would think 
of taking up The Faerie Queene for a stop-gap ? ' Select 
rather a June morning, " continues Professor Child, " when 
the brilliant white clouds are sailing slowly through a blue 
sky, a grassy bank under a tree, looking down a long valley 
with broken hills in the distance ; let mind and body both 
be at ease, and both be disposed to dream, but not to sleep, 
and when the influences of nature have had their due 
effect, open, if you please, at the middle of the Legend 
of Sir Guyon." 

(3.) Spenser is a descriptive, rather than a narrative 
poet. The Faerie Queene is full of stately and gorgeous 
pictures ; it is rich with the splendid costumes and scenery 
of a by-gone age. The reader with a keen sense of beauty 
will find something to gratify it on nearly every page of 
Spenser. He is justly called "the poets' poet/' for no 
writer is more suggestive of poetical ideas (p. 236). 

(4.) One of the chief pleasures of reading Spenser is 



34 SPENSER. 

found in the exquisite music of Ms verse. His poetry is as 
rich and sweet in sound as it is luxurious in its pictures. 
He used a long, lingering stanza, admirably fitted to the 
spirit of his poem, — named from him the Spenserian stanza. 

(5.) Spenser, even in his own day, used antiquated forms 
of language. He loved all that belonged to the Past, even 
its quaint words. He wished, moreover, to place his poem 
in a remote and ideal world, as far away as might be from 
the language, people, and scenes about him. His writings 
had no influence upon the English language. People in 
his own age criticised rather than imitated him. Ben 
Jonson said, "In affecting the ancients, he writ no lan- 
guage." 

(6.) Spenser has often been said to have been more in 
sympathy with a past age than with his own. This is 
true if we look only at his "aged accents and untimely 
words," and at his old Celtic story of King Arthur and his 
Knights ; but looking deeper, we shall find in The Faerie 
Queene most of the inspiring ideas of the Elizabethan age. 
Spenser had strong sympathy with the Eef ormation ; eager 
delight in the New Learning ; and glowing pride in En- 
gland and Elizabeth. 

Suggestions for Reading. — First Book of The Faerie Queene, 
Clarendon Press Series ; — Spenser {English Men of Letters), Chapter 
V. ; — Selections from Lowell's Essay on Spenser ; — Whipple's Litera- 
ture of the Age of Elizabeth, — Essay on Spenser. 



In this chapter we have considered:— 

1. Spenser 9 s Times. 3. His Character. 

2. His IAfe. 4. The Shepherd's Calendar. 

5. TJie Faerie Queene, 



CHAPTEE Hi. 

THE RISE OF THE DRAMA. 

The Mysteries and Miracle Plays. — The dawning of the 
English dramatic literature can be traced to a period not 
far removed from the Norman Conquest ; for, so early as 
the twelfth century, short plays were performed, repre- 
senting the lives of the saints and the most striking events 
of Bible History. These performances were intended by 
the clergy for the religious instruction of the common 
people. In other words, the miracle plays were a system 
of object-lessons to impress upon ignorant minds the 
stories and the doctrines of the Bible. So it happened 
that the first English plays were acted in churches, and 
the first play-writers and actors were priests and monks. 
The miracle plays were later performed in the church-yard, 
and still later, in the open squares of the town. By that 
time they had passed out of the hands of the clergy, and 
had been taken in charge by the different guilds and 
trades. The plays were now acted on great movable plat- 
forms, which were drawn about on wheels from point to 
point in the town. Several plays were performed on the 
same day, one play being the special charge of one trade, 
perhaps of the tailors or the fishmongers, while the play 
of Noah's Flood was quite appropriately in charge of the 
water-dealers and drawers. One of the movable platforms 
would come to a halt in a central locality, and having 
performed its play, would move on and give place to 
another. 



36 THE RISE OF THE DRAMA. 

The simple and ignorant people saw no impropriety in 
representing the most sacred beings — martyrs, saints, 
angels, even the persons of the Trinity. The Devil played 
a prominent part, and together with a character called Vice, 
furnished the comic element in the play. The fun con- 
sisted chiefly in calling hard names and in dealing blows to 
the right and left. People had not the literary taste or 
the sensitive morality which now forbids the use of vulgar 
and profane language. The miracle plays were so far from 
being thought profane in their own day, that one of the 
popes granted a pardon of a thousand days to every person 
who should "resort peaceably and with good devotion" to 
the plays at Chester. Apparently there were some spec- 
tators even then who did not treat the plays with entire 
respect, for the pope at the same time calls down a sen- 
tence of damnation on any one who presumes to interrupt 
or disturb the performance. 

These plays have no literary merit. We should remem- 
ber that they were never meant to be read, but were 
intended as illustrations, as living pictures, from the Bible. 
Occasionally there is a bit of genuine, if not very delicate 
humor, as when Noah's wife refuses to enter the Ark, and 
there follows the lively scolding and beating that was the 
highest delight of an audience in those days. 

Noye. Good wyffe, doe nowe as I thee bydde. 

Noyes Wife. Not or I see more neede, 

Though thou stande all daye and stare. 
Noye. Lorde, that wemen be crabbed aye, 

And non are meke I dare well saye ; 

That is well sene by me to daye, 

In witnesse of you ichone. 

****** 

Wiffe, come in: why standes thou their? 

Thou arte ever f rowarde, I dare well sweare ; 

Come in, one Grodes name ! halfe tyme yt were, 

For feare leste that we drowne. 



THE RISE OE THE DRAMA. 37 

Noyes Wife. Yea, sir, sette up your saile, 

And rowe fourth with evill haile, 

For withouten fayle 

I will not oute of this towne ; 

But I have my gossippes everyechone, 

One f oote further I will not gone : 

The shall not drowne, by Sante John ! 

And I maye save ther life. 

But thou lett them into thy cheiste, 

Elles rowe nowe wher thy leiste, 

And gette thee a new wiffe. 

The assistance of Shem, Ham, and Japhet is called in, and 
there is fine sport as they drive their mother into the ark. 

Again, in the play of Abraham and Isaac, there is a 
touch of real pathos in the dialogue between father and 
son before the sacrifice. The following extract is in mod- 
ernized spelling : — 

Abraham. Now, son, in thy neck this fagot thou take, 
And this fire bear in thy hand; 
For we must now sacrifice go make, 

Even after the will of God's command. 
Take this burning brand, 

My sweet child, and let us go; 
There may no man that liveth upon land 
Have more sorrow than I have woe. 
Isaac. Father, father, you go right still ; 

I pray now, father, speak unto me. 
Abraham. My good child, what is thy will? 

Tell me thy heart, I pray to thee. 
Isaac. Father, fire and wood here is plenty; 
But I can see no sacrifice ; 
What ye will offer fain would I see, 
That it were done at best advice. 
Abraham. God shall that ordain that is in heaven, 
My sweet son, for this offering; 
A dearer sacrifice may no man name 
Than this shall be, my dear darling. 
Isaac. Let be, dear father, your sad weeping; 
Your heavy looks aggrieve me sore. 
Tell me, father, your great mourning, 
And I shall seek some help therefor. 



38 THE RISE OF THE DRAMA. 

Abraham. Alas, dear son, for needs must me 

Even here thee kill, as God hath sent ; 
Thy own father thy death must be. 
Isaac. Yet work God's will, father, I you pray, 
And slay me here anon forthright ; 
And turn from me your face away 

My head when that you shall off smite. 
Abraham. Alas ! dear son, I may not choose, 

I must needs here my sweet son kill. 
My dear darling now must me lose, 

Mine own heart's blood now shall I spill. 
Yet this deed ere I fulfil, 
My sweet son, thy mouth I kiss. 
Isaac. All ready, father, even at your will 
I do your bidding, as reason is. 

Some idea of these religions dramas may be formed from 
their titles. The Creation of the World, the Fall of Man, 
the story of Cain and Abel, the Crucifixion of our Lord, 
the Play of the Blessed Sacrament, are still preserved. 
We find, besides, a great number of subjects taken from 
the lives and miracles of the saints. 

We hear of mysteries and miracle plays. The miracle 
flay was properly the dramatizing of some Scripture story, 
or of a legend of some saint. The mystery set forth any 
part of the Bible concerned with a mysterious subject, like 
the Incarnation, the Atonement, or the Resurrection. The 
names miracle play and mystery were not, however, kept 
distinct in England. 

The miracle plays were Roman Catholic in their teach- 
ing ; and in the reign of Henry VIII., when the Reforma- 
tion was steadily making its way in England, a law was 
passed prohibiting their performance, "with a view that the 
kingdom should be purged and cleansed of all religious 
plays, interludes, rhymes, ballads, and songs, which are 
equally pestiferous and noisome to the common weal." 
The miracle plays were performed at Chester as late as 
1574. A chronicle is preserved there which mentions this 
last performance : — 



THE EISE OF THE DKAMA. 39 

" Sir John Savage Knight being Mayor of Chester, 
which was the last time they were played, and we praise 
God and pray that we see not the like profanation of Holy 
Scripture ; but oh, the mercy of God for the time of our 
ignorance ! " 

The miracle play is not, however, entirely a thing of the 
past. It exists to-day in a beautiful and reverent form in 
the Passion Play of Oberammergau. 

The Moralities. — Out of the miracle play grew the 
morality, which became popular in Chaucer's century. 
This new drama taught its moral lesson not by a Script- 
ure story, but by an allegory, in which the virtues and 
vices figured as characters. The play of Magnificence, 
written by- John Skelton, may be taken as a specimen. 
The hero, Magnificence, is eaten out of house and home 
by a crowd of friends, who bear such names as "Counter- 
feit Countenance," " Crafty-conveyance," " Cloked-collu- 
sion," and " Courtly-abusion." Magnificence falls into the 
hands of Adversity and Poverty, and is finally taken pos- 
session of by Despair and Mischief, who persuade him to 
end his life. This he is about to do, when Good Hope 
stays his hand, and Circumspection and Perseverance bring 
him back to a right frame of mind. 

Nearly all the virtues and vices play a part in the moral- 
ities : Good Counsel, Eepentance, Gluttony, Pride, Avarice, 
and the like. To supply the comic scenes, the Devil was 
still retained, together with the Vice of the earlier plays. 
Vice continued to act as buffoon, a part which came to be 
thought necessary in every play, till we see it brought to 
its greatest perfection in the clowns of Shakespeare. 

First Comedy and First Tragedy. — By degrees, the vices 
and virtues of the morality plays became more and more 
human, till they dropped at last their abstract titles and 
took every-day English names. The desire to inculcate a 



40 THE RISE E THE DRAMA. 

moral lesson gradually died out, and plays were written 
to amuse, rather than to instruct. So grew up the first 
comedy and the first tragedy. The first English comedy 
was Ralph Royster Doyster, acted in 1551, and written by 
Nicholas Udall, master of Eton College. This play, as its 
name suggests, is lively and rollicking. As a picture of Lon- 
don life in the sixteenth century, it is valuable. The next 
English comedy, Gammer Gur ton's Needle, was written by 
a bishop. The whole play is occupied with the loss of a 
needle, then a rare and precious possession. "My fair, 
long, straight neele, that was myne onely treasure," says 
Gammer Gurton. And her goodman Hodge describes it : — 

" Tush, tush, her neele, her neele, her neele, man, 'tis neither flesh nor 

fish, 
A lytle thing with an hole in the end, as bright as any syller, 
Small, long, sharpe at the point, and straight as any pyller." 

Through five acts the dramatis personam search for the 
needle, and the hero even goes so far as to consult the 
devil about it. At last Hodge himself, on suddenly sit- 
ting down, discovers the needle sticking in the garment 
which Gammer Gurton had been mending. Yet less than 
forty years after this rude farce was written, English comedy 
had developed into the beautiful As You Like It and the 
sparkling Much Ado About Nothing of Shakespeare. 

The first regular tragedy in the English language was 
the play of Gorboduc, or Ferrex and Porrex, written by 
Thomas Sackville, and acted in 1562 for the entertainment 
of Queen Elizabeth. The play is written in a monotonous 
blank verse, and is full of long, stilted speeches. The plot 
consists of a dismal succession of slaughters. " Gorboduc, 
who was King of Britain about 600 B.C., divided his realm 
in his lifetime between his two sons, Eerrex and Porrex. 
The sons fell a-quarreling. The younger killed the elder. 
The mother, who loved the elder better, for revenge killed 



THE RISE OF THE DRAMA. 41 

the younger. The people, moved with the cruelty of this 
deed, rose in rebellion and slew father and mother. The 
nobility next assembled, and destroyed the rebels ; and 
afterwards they fell to civil war, in which both they and 
many of their children were slain, and the land for a long 
time was almost desolate and miserably wasted." 

Again our wonder is excited that, twenty years after, the 
appearance of Gorboduc, the English theatre entered upon 
the most glorious period of its history. 

The First Dramatic Companies. — Till near the end of the 
sixteenth century there were no regular theatres. Plays 
were performed in town-halls, court-yards of inns, cock- 
pits, and noblemen's dining-halls. 

Companies of actors calling themselves the servants of 
some nobleman whose livery they wore, were formed, and 
wandered about the country, performing wherever they 
could find an audience. Protected by the livery of their 
master against the severe laws which branded strollers as 
vagabonds, they sought the patronage of the civil author- 
ities. Town records and the household registers of illus- 
trious families abound in entries of permissions granted to 
such strolling companies, and of moneys given to them. 
Interesting entries are found in the town records of Strat- 
ford-upon-Avon, from which we learn that the players 
visited that place for the first time in 1569. In the trag- 
edy of Hamlet, such a band of strolling players act before 
the king, and produce one of the most thrilling situations 
of the drama. 

The Early Theatres. — In the year 1575, under the power- 
ful patronage of the Earl of Leicester, James Burbage built 
the first English theatre. The venture proved so success- 
ful, that twelve theatres were soon furnishing entertain- 
ment to the citizens of London. Of these the most cele- 



42 THE RISE OF THE DRAMA. 

brated was "The Globe." It was so named because its 
sign bore the effigy of Atlas supporting the globe, with the 
motto, in Latin, "All the world's a stage." Shakespeare 
Avas one of the proprietors of the Globe Theatre, and it was 
there that many of his best plays were first acted. 

Most of the theatres were entirely uncovered, excepting 
over the stage, where a thatched roof protected the actors 
from the weather. The spectators were exposed to sun- 
shine and to sterm. The boxes, or "rooms," as they were 
then styled, were arranged nearly as in the present day : 
but the musicians, instead of being placed in the orchestra, 
were in a lofty gallery over the stage. The most remark- 
able peculiarities of the early English theatres were the 
total absence of painted or movable scenery, and the neces- 
sity that the parts for women should be performed by men 
or boys, actresses being as yet unknown. A few screens of 
cloth or tapestry gave the actors the opportunity of making 
their exits and entrances ; a placard, bearing the name of 
Eome, Athens, London, or Florence, as the case might be, 
indicated to the audience the scene of the action. Sir 
Philip Sidney complains bitterly of the absurdities of the 
stage. He declares that they have Asia at one moment 
and Africa at the next, and " so many other kingdoms 
that the player, when he comes in, must ever begin with 
telling where he is, or else the tale will not be conceived. 
Now shall you have three ladies walk to gather flowers, and 
then we must believe the stage to be a garden. By and by 
we hear news of a shipwreck in the same place ; then we 
are to blame if we accept it not for a rock. Upon the back 
of that, comes out a hideous monster with fire and smoke, 
and then the miserable beholders are bound to take it for a 
cave ; while, in the meanwhile, two armies fly in, repre- 
sented with four swords and bucklers, and then what hard 
heart will not receive it for a pitched field ? M 

Certain typical articles of furniture were used. A bed 



THE EISE OF THE DEAMA. 43 

on the stage suggested a bedroom ; a table covered with 
tankards, a tavern ; a gilded chair surmounted by a can- 
opy, and called " a state/' a palace ; an altar, a church ; 
and the like. A permanent wooden structure like a scaf- 
fold, erected at the back of the stage, represented objects 
according to the requirements of the piece, such as the wall 
of a castle or besieged city, the outside of a house, or a 
position enabling one of the actors to overhear others with- 
out being seen himself. Meagre as was their stage furni- 
ture, one fact still shows that Elizabethan audiences were 
not indifferent to that part of the play which appealed to 
the eye. Never have costumes upon the stage been richer 
or more costly. Slightly worn court dresses were bought 
by actors. At a time when not more than two hundred 
dollars was paid for the play itself, four hundred dollars 
would be paid for an embroidered velvet coat, or one hun- 
dred dollars for "a robe to goo invisibell." The costumes 
were a strange mixture of all countries and ages, but such 
absurdities did not mar the enjoyment of the uncritical 
spectator of those days. 

The performance began early in the afternoon, and was 
announced by a flourish of trumpets. The most distin- 
guished patrons of the theatre were seated upon the stage 
itself, a custom to which our proscenium boxes owe their 
origin. Dancing and singing took place between the acts ; 
and usually a comic ballad, sung by a clown, closed the 
entertainment. 

Shakespeare's Early Contemporaries. — The drama was so 
popular in the sixteenth century that the writing of plays 
became the commonest form of literary industry. It was, 
indeed, the one way in which a man could support himself 
with his pen. Bright, penniless young literary adventurers 
flocked about the London theatres. Many of them were 
wild, reckless men, living from hand to mouth in garrets 



44 THE RISE OP THE DRAMA. 

and taverns, dashing off a play and spending the proceeds 
in riotous living. The story of Christopher Marlowe is 
typical. A Cambridge-bred man of marked talents, he 
lived a wild London life, drinking, fighting, and writing, 
till, at the age of twenty-nine, he was killed in a tavern 
brawl. Marlowe was born in the same year with Shake- 
speare, and was the greatest of his early contemporaries. 
Several of his plays are works of great power. The energy 
and elevation of his verse were appreciated by Ben Jonson, 
who, in his famous poem about Shakespeare, mentions also 
"Marlowe's mighty line." Marlowe wrote Dr. Faustus, 
a drama founded on the legend that Goethe used in his 
great work. The Jew of Malta, Tamhurlaine the Great, 
and Edward II. were other important works of this dram- 
atist. Chapman, Lyly, Peele, Greene, and Kyd were also 
fellow-dramatists of Shakespeare in his early life. We 
appreciate the vast play-writing industry of those days, 
when we learn that one manager records in the course of 
twelve years two hundred and seventy plays accepted by 
his theatre ; while we are told that at least forty dramatists 
were at work in London. In studying Shakespeare, we 
must never lose sight of the ceaseless activity in play- writ- 
ing peculiar to his time. 

Suggestions for Reading. — Richard Grant White's Rise and Prog- 
ress of the English Drama (contained in Vol. I. of White's Shakes- 
peare); — Hudson's Origin and Growth of the Drama in England 
(contained in Shakespeare's Life, Art, and Characters). 



In this chapter we have considered: — 

1. The Mysteries and Miracle Plays, 

2. The Moralities. 

3. The First Comedy and Tragedy. 

4. The First Dramatic Companies. 

5. The Early Theatres. 

6. Shakespeare's Early Contemporaries. 



CHAPTEH IV* 



WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 
(1564-1616.) 

"He was not of an age, but for all time." — Ben Jonson. 
"Dear son of memory, great heir of fame." — Milton. 
"And he, the man whom Nature selfe had made 
To mock herself e and Truth to imitate." — Spenser. 

"In the time of Elizabeth and James, the theatre was almost 
the only medium of communication between writers and the people, 
and attracted to it all those who aimed to gain a livelihood out of 
the products of their hearts and imaginations. Its literature was 
the popular literature of the age. It was newspaper, magazine, 
novel, all in one. It was the Elizabethan Times, the Elizabethan 
Blackwood, the Elizabethan Temple Bar : it tempted into its arena, 
equally the Elizabethan Thackerays and the Elizabethan Braddons." 
— Whipple. 

"He is the only writer who can be to us in one brief half hour 
our jester, our singer, our friend, our consoler, our prophet (but 
never our priest), our sage, — ourselves. .There is no mood of our 
lives that was not a mood of his mind ; no sorrow or joy of our 
hearts that was not a sorrow or a joy of his brain. His intellect was 
the abstract of humanity." — Richard Grant White. 

"The name of Shakespeare is the greatest in our literature — it is 
the greatest in all literature. No man ever came near him in the 
creative powers of the mind; no man ever had such strength at once, 
and such variety of imagination. Coleridge has most felicitously 
applied to him a Greek epithet, given before to I know not whom, 
certainly none so deserving of it, — [xvpcovovg, the thousand- souled 
Shakespeare. " — Hallam. 

Authentic Biography. — The greatest writer in the history 
of English Literature has the briefest biography. From 
the parish records of Stratford, from some old legal docu- 
ments, and from a few contemporary references, we are 



46 SHAKESPEAEE. 

able to arrive at the following facts about William Shake- 
speare : — 

John and Mary Shakespeare were his parents. He was 
christened in the little town of Stratford-upon-Avon, in 
Warwickshire, England, the 26th day of April, 1564. 
Although John Shakespeare could not write his name, he 
was one of the most important citizens of Stratford, and 
held one office after another, until he became high bailiff, 
or mayor. From the date of Shakespeare's baptism, we 
have no certain knowledge of him, till we find the record 
of his marriage, in his nineteenth year. He married Anne 
Hathaway, a woman eight years older than himself. Her 
home was at Shottery, a pretty village a mile across the 
fields from Stratford. They had three children . Nothing 
is known of Shakespeare from this time, till he is heard 
of in London, in 1592, as a successful actor and author. 
Our first knowledge of him as a dramatist, comes to us 
through a foolish pun. Eobert Greene was a poor un- 
happy playwright, who, as he lay dying in his wretched 
garret, wrote his Groat's Worth of Wit, Bought with a 
Million of Repentance. This was a worthless little pam- 
phlet, that would have been forgotten long ago, had it 
not contained a reference to Shakespeare. Greene warns 
his fellow- writers to beware of players : " Yes, trust them 
not : for there is an upstart Crow, beautified with our 
feathers, that with his tyger's heart wrapt in a player's 
hide, supposes he is as well able to bumbast out a blanke 
verse as the best of you : and being an absolute Johannes 
factotum, is in his owne conceit the onely Shake-scene in 
a country." Shakespeare evidently took offense at this 
stupid and spiteful mention of himself, for he was offered a 
handsome apology by Chettle, Greene's executor, avIio had 
published the pamphlet : — (( I am as sory," said Chettle, 
"as if the originall fault had beene my fault, because 
my selfe have seene his demeanor no lesse civill, than 



SHAKESPEARE. 47 

he exelent in the qualitie lie professes ; besides, divers of 
worship have reported his uprightnes of dealing, which 
argues his honesty, and his facetious grace in writting, that 
approves his art." From this time Shakespeare is heard of 
as actor, author, and theatre manager, though almost noth- 
ing can be learned of his private life. By 1597, he had 
grown so prosperous as to buy New Place, in Stratford, one 
of the best houses in the town. In the next year he is re- 
ferred to as a popular dramatist. Francis Meres, in 1598, 
wrote a book in which he happened to say : " As Plautus 
and Seneca are accounted the best for Comedy and Trag- 
edy among the Latines, so Shakespeare among the En- 
glish is the most excellent in both kinds for the stage : for 
Comedy, witness his Gentlemen of Verona, his Errors, his 
Love labors lost, his Love labours wonne, his Midsummers 
night dreame, and his Merchant of Venice; for Tragedy, 
his Richard the 2, Richard the S, Henry the J/., King John, 
Titus Andronicus, and his Romeo and Juliet" From 
year to year, plays from Shakespeare's pen appeared, and 
marriages and deaths took place in his family : that is as 
much as can be said with certainty. His last years were 
spent in Stratford, where he died on the 23d of April, 1616. 
He was buried in the parish church of Stratford. In the 
wall, above his grave, a monument is erected, containing 
his bust.* This bust and the coarse engraving by Droesh- 
out, prefixed to the first folio edition of his works published 
in 1 623, are the most trustworthy of his portraits. But few 
relics of Shakespeare now remain. The house of New Place 
was long ago destroyed ; but the garden in which it stood, 
and, in another street, the house where the poet was bora, 
are preserved. 

* The pavement over his grave bears the following startling inscription : 

" Good frend, for Iesvs sake forbeare, 
To digg the dvst encloased heare : 
Bleste he ye man yt spares thes stones, 
And cvrst be he yt moves my bones.' ' 



48 SHAKESPEARE. 

Traditional Biography. — He who reads the life of Shake- 
speare will wish to repeat with his biographer, Mr. Halliwell- 
Phillips, the beautiful lines of Shakespeare'' s own sonnet : — 

"When to the sessions of. sweet silent thought, 
I summon up remembrance of things past, 
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought." 

There have been many attempts to fill the gaps in Shake- 
speare' s history. 

(1.) It is highly probable that in his boyhood he went to 
the Free Grammar School of Stratford. An ancient desk is 
still shown, said to have been Shakespeare's three centuries 
ago, when he went 

" with his satchel 



And shining morning face, creeping like snail 
Unwillingly to school." 

His friend Ben Jonson said that he had " small Latin and 
less Greek " ; but it must be remembered that so learned 
a man as Jonson would have been likely to say the same of 
any college graduate of our own day. Shakespeare proba- 
bly had little schooling ; but there never lived a man more 
quick to learn from the world about him, or one made wiser 
by his knowledge. There seems much to support the guess 
that when his brief school-days were over, he became a 
lawyer's clerk ; for throughout his works he shows a marked 
familiarity with the technical language of the law. Other 
professions also claim him ; in fact, he has been assigned to 
at least twenty-four occupations. 

(2.) The most familiar legend of Shakespeare's youth rep- 
resents him as a wild young fellow, joining in a deer-stealing 
expedition to Sir Thomas Lucy's park at Oharlcote, near 
Stratford. According to the story, the hot-headed old bar- 
onet caused the ringleader, Will Shakespeare, to be seized 



SHAKESPEARE. 49 

and flogged. The youth revenged himself by writing some 
silly doggerel, which he posted on the park gates. Then, 
says the legend, the wrath of Sir Thomas grew so formi- 
dable that the culprit fled to London. There another tra- 
dition takes him up, and relates that he first earned a liv- 
ing in London by holding horses at the doors of the 
theatres. 

(3.) The story of the deer-stealing is not needed to ac- 
count for Shakespeare's departure from Stratford, to seek 
his fortune in London. He had a wife and three children 
to care for, with only his own hand and brain to depend 
upon. His father had met with one misfortune after an- 
other, till he was able to do nothing toward helping his 
son on in the world. London was the resort for a needy 
adventurer like Shakespeare ; and in London, to a young 
man with talent and without money, no other calling offered 
a promise of such quick success as that of the actor. Hun- 
dreds of young adventurers, pouring in from the country, 
began life precisely as we suppose Shakespeare did. It 
is believed that he not only acted, but that he also re-ar- 
ranged old plays, added a scene here, cut one out there, 
brightened the dialogue, and then looked to it that the 
whole was adapted for practical use on the stage. By act- 
ing and by revising other men's plays, Shakespeare, then, 
discovered his own dramatic genius. Measured roughly, his 
career as dramatist covered twenty years, the last decade 
of the sixteenth century and the first decade of the seven- 
teenth. 

(4.) Of Shakespeare as an actor there is again no certain 
knowledge. A tradition says that he played the Ghost in 
Hamlet, and the old servant Adam in As You Like It, and 
that he acted in his friend Ben Jonson's play, Every Man 
in his Humour. We may be sure, from Hamlet's admi- 
rable " directions to the players," that Shakespeare himself 



50 SHAKESPEARE. 

understood the theory of acting, and that he was a critic 
of the most correct taste. We guess, however, that he was 
no actor. One of his sonnets implies that he had, at least, 
no love for his art : — 

"0, for my sake do you with Fortune chide, 
That did not better for my life provide 
Than public means which public manners breeds. 
Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, 
And almost thence my nature is subdued 
• To what it works in, like the dyer's hand." 

The foremost actor of that day, who first played Shake- 
speare's great tragic characters, was Richard Burbage, the 
original Hamlet, Othello, and Lear. 

(5.) As a theatrical manager, Shakespeare appears to 
have been highly successful. The plays from his own 
pen, with which he constantly supplied his theatre, made, 
doubtless, no small part of its success. Before he was fifty, 
he retired from the Globe Theatre and returned to Strat- 
ford with a competence. We know nothing of the manner 
in which he spent his last quiet years. 

I His Sonnets. — Most students of Shakespeare believe that 
from his sonnets much may be learned about his private 
history. Writing in honor of the sonnet, Wordsworth 

" With this key 
Shakespeare unlocked his heart." 

The sonnets tell a passionate story of love and friendship ; 
and we can but believe that they reveal to us much of 
Shakespeare's inner life and personal character. He be- 
comes more lovable as we see his own power of loving, and 
as we see how generously he could put himself aside, how 
nobly he could forgive a wrong. Here is one of the most 
beautiful of the sonnets : — 



SHAKESPEAEE. 51 

"When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, 

I all alone beweep my outcast state 
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries, 

And look upon myself and curse my fate, 
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, 

Featur'd like him, like him with friends possess'd, 
Desiring this man's art and that man's scope, 

With what I most enjoy contented least ; 
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising, • 

Haply I think on thee, and then my state, 
Like to the lark at break of day arising 

From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate; 
For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings 
That then I scorn to change my state with kings." 

We hear much of the thrift and prosperity of Shake- 
speare ; in the sonnets we learn, too, that he was often sad 
and discontented with his lot. These poems possess one 
marked peculiarity : they remind the reader constantly of 
Shakespeare's certainty that his verse will live. In his 
other writings there is not a trace of this ; and it is well 
known that he was inexcusably careless about preserving 
his plays. But here are such lines as, — 

"Do thy worst, old Time; despite thy wrong, 
My love shall in my verse ever live young." 

" Not marble, nor the gilded monuments 
Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme. " 

In addition to their personal interest, the sonnets have 
great literary beauty. They are not of even excellence, 
hut here and there are lines of poetry as exquisite as any 
in the dramas. 

Early Poems. — Shakespeare's first writings were not dra- 
matic. By two narrative poems he achieved a position as 
a poet which he could not have acquired as a " play-actor" 
or a play-writer. Venus and Adonis, published in 1593, 
was dedicated to his fashionable and agreeable young friend, 



52 SHAKESPEAEE. 

the Earl of Southampton. " The first heir of my inven- 
tion," Shakespeare called this poem, though he had al- 
ready written several plays. Dramatic writing had, it may 
be said, no social position. Ben Jonson was laughed at 
when he named his dramas "Works." Venus and Adonis 
was followed by Lucrece, which also became one of the 
fashionable poems of the day. Both were "mellifluous 
and honey-tongued," as Meres had said of Shakespeare. 
To readers of the present day these poems appear far- 
fetched, over-ingenious, overdone in many ways, but oc- 
casional lines make them worthy of Shakespeare. 

Classification of Shakespeare's Plays. — The first collected 
edition of Shakespeare's plays, the famous First Folio, was 
published seven years after his death, in 1623. In this 
volume the plays were roughly classified as histories, come- 
dies, and tragedies ; and such a division has since been 
followed by many editors. Comedy and tragedy are not so 
sharply separated, however, by Shakespeare himself. He 
did not find them divided in human life ; accordingly, 
when he wrote his darkest tragedy, he introduced a comic 
scene, as in King Lear; to his most sparkling comedy, he 
added a tragic incident, as in Much Ado About Nothing. 
This blending of tragic and comic in the same piece is one 
of the marked characteristics of the English drama in the 
age of Elizabeth. 

A simple classification of the plays that may be more 
useful for our purpose is based on the sources from which 
they were derived. These sources are historical, semi-his- 
torical, or fictitious. (1.) One series of historical plays 
relates to the history of England, and another to that of 
Eome. The English plays cover nearly all the reigns from 
Richard II. to Henry VIII. Several dramas deal with the 
fifteenth century, and with the Wars of the Eoses; for 
Shakespeare understood well the value of civil war as 



SHARES PEA KB. 53 

material for the drama. This confusing period becomes 
clearer and more thrilling in his pages than in any formal 
history. His plays are filled with the patriotism of the 
Elizabethan age, and must forever stir an Englishman's 
heart with pity for the disasters of his country, or with 
pride in her glory. Shakespeare's own love of England 
culminates in the noble play of Henry V., "a, splendid 
dramatic song to the glory of England." Here he pre- 
sents his portrait of the ideal king in his favorite hero of 
history, Henry V. 

As Shakespeare did not write pure tragedy, neither did 
he write pure history. Comedy finds its way into the most 
dignified history ; for it is in the play of Henry IV. that 
we find Ealstaff, the greatest comic character of English 
literature. 

The materials for his English historical plays were drawn 
by Shakespeare chiefly from Holinshed's Chronicle. The 
materials for his three great Roman plays he took from 
Plutarch's Lives. 

(2.) In addition to the dramas founded on authentic his- 
tory, Shakespeare wrote several of a semi-historical char- 
acter. Hamlet, Macbeth, and Lear are among these leg- 
endary plays. The story of Hamlet comes from an old 
Danish chronicler, and is at least half true ; Macbeth, 
Lear, and Cymbeline are founded on ancient Scottish and 
British legends. 

(3.) Nineteen plays of Shakespeare are based on fiction. 
He never gave himself the trouble to invent a plot. ' He 
helped himself to a good story wherever he found it : in 
an old play, perhaps, or in an Italian novel ; in the pages 
of Plutarch or in the history of his own country. The 
Merchant of Venice is an instance. Shakespeare took 
three distinct stories, melted them down, and ran them 
into a new mould of perfect symmetry. The first of the 
three, the casket story, he probably took from the Gesta 



54 SHAKESPEARE. 

Romanorum, the great story-book of Europe in the Middle 
Ages. The incident of the bond and pound of flesh is also 
found in the Gesta Romanorum. This was a very popular 
story, and occurred again and again in novels and plays of 
that time. Even the little episode of the rings is a part of 
the old tale. The other thread of the plot, the story of 
Lorenzo and Jessica, is also to be found in an Italian novel. 
One thing may be noticed : although these stories had 
been told over and over before Shakespeare wrote, — they 
are found in Latin, Italian, and French as well as in En- 
glish, — after he had used them, no one else ventured to 
touch them. 

Shakespeare's attention was concentrated on invention 
not of story, but of character. The superiority of what 
he invents to what he borrows, may be seen in a play like 
Much Ado About Nothing. This was intended to drama- 
tize the Italian tale of Hero and Olaudio. To fill out the 
play with minor characters, he invented Beatrice and Bene- 
dick, and added Dogberry and Verges. Most readers will 
agree that the interest in the original story is far less than 
in these creations of Shakespeare. 

Some of the thirty-seven dramas attributed to Shake- 
speare show the traces of another writer. It was the cus- 
tom of the time for two playwrights to work together, — a 
custom that has caused great perplexity to students of 
Shakespeare. They feel sure that the three parts of Henry 
VI. are old dramas merely retouched by him. So, too, the 
best authorities believe that the last of the historical plays, 
Henry VIII., was in great part written by Fletcher. 

Chronology of the Plays. — The arrangement of the 
dramas in an order approaching that in which they were 
written, has been one of the problems of recent Shake- 
speare scholarship. We may arrive at dates for them in 
several ways : the month and year in which a play was 



SHAKESPEARE. 55 

registered for publication gives an approximate date ; the 
mention of a work by a contemporary writer, like Meres, is 
often very valuable ; again, there are in the plays themselves 
evidences of their chronology that have received careful 
study. We notice differences of style which make us sure 
that certain plays were written in youth, and certain others 
in mature manhood. That which is clearly the earlier 
writing of Shakespeare is more highly ornamented ; it 
contains more puns, classical allusions, and far-fetched 
figures than are found in his later works. The story be- 
comes of less importance in the mature plays, while the 
characters grow more absorbing. We may also discover 
differences in the verse itself. The rhyme, of which there 
is so much in the younger plays, almost disappears, and 
there are marked changes in the structure of the verse. 

Construction of Plot. — Shakespeare paid little heed to 
the dramatic unities of time and place.* Unity of action 
he made his chief aim. His skill as a playwright is shown 
in the success with which he wove together a variety of 
materials so as to produce oneness and completeness of 
effect. Tlie Merchant of Venice has been mentioned as an 
example of this skill. 

If we examine one of his great tragedies, we see how 
closely it follows the principles of dramatic construction. 
The first act states the situation ; in the second, the story 
grows ; in the third, the grand climax is reached ; the 
fourth contains the catastrophe that results from the great 
events of thte third act ; the fifth act is the breaking up, or 
dissolution. 



* Three rules were carefully observed in the composition of a Greek play : 
1. That there should be a distinct plot with one main action, to which all the minor 
parts of the play should contribute. 2. That the incidents of the play should natu- 
rally come within one day. 3. That the entire action should naturally occur in one 
place. These three rules are known as the Unity of Action, the Unity of Time, and 
the Unity of Place, or as " the dramatic unities." 



56 SHAKESPEARE. 

Purpose. — Shakespeare's plays are works of art ; he 
wrote them with an artistic purpose, and with no other. 
They teach us lessons as life itself does. In no other sense 
can Shakespeare be said to convey a moral. Certain crit- 
ics, the Germans especially, would have us believe that 
each of his plays works out some philosophical idea, that 
in each some one great truth is to be discovered. Such 
criticism is far-fetched and unprofitable. Shakespeare 
probably wrote with a simpler purpose than most of his 
admirers are willing to acknowledge : he wrote to give 
himself and others pleasure. 

Treatment of Character. — It is said that the character of 
Hamlet has been more discussed than that of any hero of 
history. The serious consideration and minute analysis 
to which Shakespeare's characters have been subjected is 
perhaps the finest tribute to their reality. They are to us 
living men and women : we argue about them, gossip about 
them, love them, hate them, as if they were of the same 
flesh and blood as ourselves. Their reality is partly due to 
their many-sidedness. They are not mere pictures or mere 
flat surfaces ; they stand out so that we see them on every 
side. They present to us many phases : one man is not all 
avarice, another all ambition. A clumsy writer often makes 
his men and women personifications of vices and virtues, till 
they are little better than creatures of allegory. But Shake- 
speare never forgets how mixed and how varied is the nature 
of man. The variety of characters created by him is indeed- 
amazing. We find in Shakespeare the noblest -and purest 
men and women, and also the meanest and most foolish. 
"Milton," says Whipple, "can do justice to the Devil, 
though not, like Shakespeare, to 'poor devils. ,,: The 
genius that created Sir Andrew Aguecheek had the same 
quality as that which produced Hamlet or Lear. 

It was by virtue of this intense sympathy, which seems • 



SHAKESPEARE. 5? 

the union of a powerful imagination with a large heart, 
that Shakespeare could so forget himself in his characters. 
For the moment he himself ceased to exist ; he toas Mac- 
beth or Hamlet or Othello. He was so great a dramatist 
and so true an artist that we lose sight of him completely. 
To read his character from his plays is pure guess-work. 
The qualities of the writer are before us, but Shakespeare 
the man remains forever a mystery. 

Shakespeare was separated from his home, and probably 
lived among men almost exclusively ; yet hlTenters into the 
natures of women, becomes Portia or Eosalind or Juliet, as 
readily as he assumes the guise of Shylock or Romeo. This 
is all the more wonderful when we remember that in draw- 
ing these varied types of character, he knew that they 
would be intrusted in representation to boys or young men, 
— English women not appearing on the stage before 1661, 
long after the age which witnessed such creations as Ophe- 
lia, Lady Macbeth, Eosalind, and Juliet. The author 
must himself have felt what he makes Cleopatra say : 

" The quick comedians 
Extemporary shall stage us ; Antony 
Shall be brought drunken forth, and I shall see 
Some squeaking Cleopatra boy my greatness." 

Nature in Shakespeare. — Human nature is always first 
in interest to Shakespeare ; yet the outer world is used by 
him as background with exquisite artistic feeling. Notice 
" Shakespeare and the side glances that his characters cast 
at the nature that surrounds them. And these glances are 
like everything else in him, rapid, vivid, and intense. 

' Lady ! by yonder silver moon I swear, 
That tips with silver all the fruit-tree tops.' 

How these words shed round us all the loveliness of the 



58 SHAKESPEARE. 

Italian night ! " One should notice the weather in which 
Shakespeare sets his dramas : the hot midsummer of Romeo 
and Juliet ; the tempest in King Lear ; while in Macbeth 

" Light thickens, and the crow 
Makes wing to the rooky wood ; 
Good things of day begin to droop and drowse, 
While night's black agents to their prey do rouse." 

Poetry of Shakespeare. — Shakespeare was not only a 
dramatist, great in the construction of a play and in the 
creation of character, but he was, besides, the noblest of 
our poets. He had the exquisite sensitiveness, the fer- 
vid imagination, and the profound emotion that produce 
poetry. 

Shakespeare's Influence in the History of our Language 

has been powerful and lasting. To him, more than to any 
other man since Chaucer, the English language is indebted. 
The common version of the Bible, made in 1611, and the 
writings of Shakespeare, have been the preservers of En- 
glish speech. The general reading of two books that are 
models of simplicity, and of care in the choice of words, 
has given to the millions of the English-speaking race a' 
rich and fixed vocabulary. It was nearly three centuries 
ago that Shakespeare wrote, yet we read him to-day to find 
that, while he made the language of his predecessors obso- 
lete, his own vocabulary has withstood the assaults of time, 
and is still fresh and vigorous. 

The Shakespearean Dramatists is a name rightly given 
to the group of playwrights that surrounded Shakespeare. 
In many qualities they were Shakespearean. (1.) In Ford's 
love-plays were tenderness and pathos unsurpassed in his 
time. His most famous work was The Broken Heart ; in- 
deed, broken hearts were always his theme. (2.) Webster's 
greatness lay in his power to excite terror and pity His 



SHAKESPEARE. 59 

only interest is in crime and suffering, which he depicts 
with terrible power. The Duchess of Malfy is his best 
known work. (3.) Massinger was a graceful and agree- 
able writer, to be read, says Charles Lamb, "with com- 
posure and placid delight." His play, The New Way to 
Pay Old Debts, containing the character of Sir Giles 
Overreach, is still well known upon the stage. (4.) The 
famous literary partners, Beaumont and Fletcher, were 
strongly under the influence and inspiration of Shake- 
speare, and several of their plays are so graceful, humor- 
ous, and romantic, as to suggest a comparison with come- 
dies like Much Ado About Nothing and As You Like It. 
But they are far below Shakespeare in their character- 
painting. Among their plays are The Maid's Tragedy, 
Philaster, and The Knight of the Burning Pestle. Fletcher's 
pastoral drama, The Faithful Shepherdess, contains some 
lovely poetry, and is said to have inspired Milton's Comus. 

Ben Jonson was the most imposing of the later Eliza- 
bethan dramatists. Although a warm friend of Shake- 
speare, Jonson was, of all the writers mentioned, the least 
in sympathy with his dramatic methods. He was a man 
of profound learning, powerful mind, and acute observa- 
tion. His deep respect for the classics led him to follow 
slavishly the rules of the Greek drama, and to blame 
Shakespeare unsparingly for his lawless neglect of them. 
Jonson's method of treating character was also the opposite 
of Shakespeare's. Instead of presenting the many-sided 
and complex human nature of real life, he aimed, accord- 
ing to the title of his famous play, to exhibit ' ' every man 
in his humor," or under the influence of his special pecu- 
liarity. The best of his dramas are Sejanus, Catiline, The 
Silent Woman, and The Alchemist. 

While Jonson' s plays were heavy and lifeless, he strangely 
enough had great success in the airy and elegant little 



60 ' SHAKESPEARE. 

dramas called masques. Among the most famous is his 
Masque of Queens. Jonson was also a prose writer. His 
Discoveries contain many valuable notes on books and men, 
— those on Shakespeare and Bacon being of especial interest. 
Ben Jonson was in his time as commanding a figure as 
Samuel Johnson became a century and a half later. In 
many respects the two men resembled each other. Both 
were egotistical, self-willed, and overbearing, yet frank, 
generous, and social in temper, truly upright and earnest 
in purpose. At the famous "wit combats" of the Mer- 
maid Tavern, Jonson was the autocrat, as Johnson was 
afterward monarch of The Club. 

Close of the Elizabethan Drama. — With these writers 
the glory of the English drama departed. The passion, im- 
agination, and moral earnestness of the Elizabethan writers 
had died away. The plays of Beaumont and Fletcher, friv- 
olous in morals and feeble in character-drawing, were the 
most popular upon the stage from the death of Shakespeare 
till the Commonwealth. The extinction of the drama was 
hastened by the breaking out of the Civil War in 1642 and 
by the enactments of Parliament in 1642, 1647, and 1648, 
which closed the theatres and suppressed the dramatic pro- 
fession. From that date until the Restoration, all theatrical 
performances were illegal. 

Upon Cromwell's death, in 1658, a theatre was re-opened 
in Drury Lane. With this event began a new chapter in 
the history of the English stage. 

Suggestions for Reading. — Julius Ccesar, As You Like It, Mac- 
beth, edited by Henry N. Hudson ;— Whipple's Age of Elizabeth- 
Essay on Shakespeare and on Characteristics of Elizabethan Litera- 
ture ; — Lowell's Essay on Shakespeare ; — Dowden's Primer of Shake- 
speare, Chapters I. and II. ; — Hudson's Life, Art, and Characters of 
Shakespeare, the chapters on Julius Cmsar, As You Like It, and 
Macbeth. 



SHAKESPEARE. 6i 

In this chapter we have considered :— 

1. The Authentic Biography of Shakespeare, 

2. The Traditional Biography, 

3. The Sonnets. 

4. His Early Poems, 

5. Classification of His Plays, 

6. Chronology of His Plays, 

7. Construction of Plot, 

8. Purpose, 

9. Treatment of Character, 

10. Nature in Shakespeare. 

11. Poetry of Shakespeare. 

12. Influence upon the Language. 

13. The Shakespearean Dramatists, 
14=, Ben Jonson, 

15, Close of the Elizabethan Drama, 



CHAPTER V- 



FRANCIS BACON. 

(1561-1626.) 

"The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind." — Pope. 

"The great secretary of nature and all learning." — Walton. 

"He had the sound, distinct, comprehensive knowledge of Aris- 
totle, with all the beautiful lights, graces, and embellishments of 
Cicero. " — Addison. 

" He may be compared with those liberators of nations who have 
given laws by which they might govern themselves, and retained no 
homage but their gratitude." — Hallam. 

t ' Who is there that upon hearing the name of Lord Bacon does 
not instantly recognize everything of genius the most profound, 
everything of literature the most extensive, everything of discovery 
the most penetrating, everything of observation of human life the 
most distinguishing and refined." — Burke. 

" My conceit of his person was never increased towards him by his 
place or honors ; but I have and do reverence him for the greatness 
that was only proper to himself : in that he seemed to me ever, by his 
work, one of the greatest men and most worthy of admiration that 
had been in many ages. In his adversity I ever prayed God would 
give him strength ; for greatness he could not want. " — Ben Jonson. 

Prose Writers of the Elizabethan Age. — The Elizabethan 
age was the great age of English poetry : prose held but a 
second place. (1.) Holinshed wrote his Chronicle, a his- 
tory of England and Scotland, from which Shakespeare 
drew much material. (2.) Sir Walter Ealeigh, imprisoned 
in the Tower, whiled away his time by composing a History 
of the World, beginning with the Creation. (3.) Eichard 
Hooker, a man of piety and vast learning, was the cham- 



BACON. 63 

pion of the principles of the Church of England against 
the encroachments of Puritanism. The work for which he 
is famous is A Treatise on the Laws of Ecclesiastical Pol- 
ity, an eloquent argument for the Church of England, set 
forth in a style dignified and stately. One of the famous 
sentences of the English literature is found in the first 
hook of The Ecclesiastical Polity : — 

" Of law there can be no less acknowledged than that her seat is 
the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world : all things in 
heaven and earth do her homage ; the very least as feeling her care, 
and the greatest as not exempted from her power ; both angels and 
men, and creatures of what condition soever, though each in different 
sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent, admiring her as the 
mother of their peace and joy." 

The greatest prose writer of the Elizabethan age was 
Francis Bacon. 

Bacon's Life. — Francis Bacon was the younger son of Sir 
Nicholas Bacon, who was Lord Keeper of the Great Seal 
of England, and a statesman honored and trusted by Queen 
Elizabeth. Bacon's mother was a woman strong in mind 
and in character, and, like many women of that day, 
she was "exquisitely skilled in the Greek and Latin 
tongues." 

Bacon was brought up amid surroundings that were dig- 
nified, elegant, and refined. He found himself, when a 
child, of social importance, petted by the Queen herself, 
who laughed at his bright speeches and called him her 
little Lord Keeper. His strongest instinct was his devo- 
tion to royalty. The story is told that when Bacon was a 
little boy, the Queen asked him his age. He replied, like 
a true courtier, " I am two years younger than your Maj- 
esty's happy reign." 

Bacon was in boyhood small and delicate, but of remark- 
ably precocious mind. When thirteen years of age, he 
went to the University of Cambridge. There he began his 



64 BACON. 

career as an independent thinker. He was impatient with 
the dry and lifeless lessons that he was set to learn. He 
found philosophy, as he said afterwards, "rather talkative 
than productive." He was impatient with the instructors 
who taught over and over again the dogmas of the old 
philosophy, and who, spite of their powerful, active minds, 
had not courage to strike out into any new line of thought. 
Francis Bacon, lad as he was, was fairly tingling with new 
ideas. His college days could not have been very happy : 
he despised his tasks and his teachers ; and in his fellow- 
students he saw men like "becalmed ships, that never 
move but by the wind of other men's breath, and have no 
oars of their own to steer withal. " He left Cambridge at the 
age of sixteen ; and, that a finishing touch might be added 
to his education, his father sent him to Paris as an attach^ 
of the English ambassador. A youth so eager and alert as 
Bacon advanced rapidly in his knowledge of the world. 
The boy of seventeen, while in France, was studiously col- 
lecting material for his first literary work, on no less a sub- 
ject than The State of .Europe. 

The death of his father summoned Bacon home from 
France, and changed completely his position and prospects. 
He was now a youth of nineteen, without money and with- 
out influence, with only his ambition and his intellect to 
help him in winning his way to eminence. Poverty was a 
great misfortune to him, for he had been born and bred to 
luxury ; he loved things costly and beautiful ; he was mag- 
nificent as a prince in his tastes. The struggle to gratify 
these tastes kept him throughout life burdened with debt. 

He appears to have started in life with two purposes : 
first, he intended to achieve worldly success, which to him 
meant political power and the surroundings of wealth ; and 
secondly, he was filled with an honest desire for a reforma- 
tion of learning. He saw that men were not making the 
best use of their minds, that knowledge was of little prac- 



BACON. 65 

tical value. The desire to be of service to the world by 
helping it "to rebuild human knowledge from a firm and 
solid basis" was Bacon's sincere and noble purpose, and 
was kept steadily in mind during his long and busy polit- 
ical career. In his youth he begged his uncle Burleigh, 
the Lord Treasurer, that some office, with light duties, and 
yet with generous compensation, might be given to him, in 
order that he might have the time and the means for 
becoming " a pioneer in the deep mines of truth." In one 
of his letters he said that he had " vast contemplative ends," 
and that he had "taken all knowledge for his province." 

His sturdy old uncle laughed at him, and Bacon turned 
next to Burleigh's rival, the brilliant and generous Essex, 
for "influence" was then even more necessary than now to 
further a young man's fortunes. Essex aided Bacon with 
lavish gifts of money, and did his best to procure office for 
him. Years after, when Bacon was so far on in the world 
as to be the Queen's own lawyer, he was called upon to 
prosecute his old friend for acts of treason. The charges 
were proved, and the penalty of death was inflicted. It 
may have been Bacon's duty as a public official to aid in 
the prosecution of Essex ; but it was his duty as a man to 
be loyal to an old friendship. A dark suspicion of ingrati- 
tude rests upon his memory. History has not satisfactorily 
excused his conduct ; though, on the other hand, the 
charge that Bacon desperately sought the life of Essex, for 
the sake of winning Elizabeth's favor, is altogether im- 
probable. 

From the time that Bacon was admitted to the bar in 
1582, his political career was for many years one of steady 
advancement. In his profession he was renowned for brill- 
iancy and learning ; in the House of Commons he was 
recognized as a masterly orator. 

" There happened in my time one noble speaker who was full of 
gravity in his speaking. His language, when he could spare or pass 



66 BACON. 

a jest, was nobly censorious. No man ever spoke more neatly, more 
pressly, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness in 
what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted of his own 
graces. His hearers could not cough or look aside from him without 
loss. He commanded where he spoke, and had his judges angry and 
pleased at his devotion. No man had their affections more in his 
power. The fear of every man that heard him was lest he should 
make an end." * 

On the coronation of James I., in 1603, Bacon was 
knighted, and at the same time was married to Alice Barn- 
ham, the daughter of a London alderman. He was after- 
ward elected to more than one Parliament, and was ap- 
pointed Solicitor-G-eneral, then Attorney- General, then 
Lord Keeper, with the title of Baron Verulam, and was 
finally made Lord-Chancellor and Viscount St. Albans. 

Bacon now, at the age of sixty, might be thought to 
have attained every ambition ; when, suddenly, like a 
thunder-bolt, there fell upon him disgrace and ruin. He 
was accused and convicted of taking bribes when acting as 
judge ; and, though the gifts he had received had never 
influenced him to give an unjust decision, that excuse does 
not clear Bacon's reputation. Nor does it excuse him that 
bribery and corruption under James I. were the order of 
the day. He was condemned to lose the chancellorship, to 
pay a fine of forty thousand pounds, to be imprisoned dur- 
ing the King's pleasure, to be ineligible to any office in the 
state, and was forbidden to sit in Parliament, or to come 
within twelve miles of the court. But a remission of these 
penalties was soon granted, and, in 1624, an annual pension 
of twelve hundred pounds was bestowed upon him for life. 

The life of the fallen minister was prolonged for five 
years after his disgrace. In spite of his misfortunes and 
of his pecuniary embarrassments, those were his most fruit- 
ful years. He died in 1626. Riding in his carriage one 

* Ben Jonsoiv referring to Bacon. 






BACON. 67 

spring day, when the snow was falling, it occurred to him 
that snow might serve as well as salt in preserving flesh. 
So, stopping at a cabin by the roadside, he bought a fowl, 
for the purpose of trying the experiment. By the slight 
exposure he was chilled, and thrown into a sudden and 
fatal fever. To use the words of Lord Macaulay, "The 
great apostle of experimental philosophy was destined to 
be its martyr, " 

Bacon's Service to Science. — The learning to which 
Bacon found men devoting their minds was learning 
twenty centuries old, out of which the life was gone. 
Scholars turned over and over again the old knowledge, 
and contented themselves with a cunning re-arrangement 
of learning, which deceived them into thinking that they 
were growing wiser. They discovered nothing that made 
the world better off. It was thought beneath the dignity 
of philosophy to concern itself with practical, every-day 
matters. Bacon saw the folly of the philosophers. He 
said to them : Throw down your books ; come down out 
of the clouds. i ' The only clue and method is to begin all 
anew, and direct our steps in a certain order, from the 
very first perceptions of the senses." Look at the world 
about you ; be alert, awake ; observe ; experiment ; set in 
order your observations and experiments ; compare, medi- 
tate, and you will by and by discover a new truth of 
Nature. — Such is the process of Induction. It was no 
invention of Bacon ; it is as old as the mind of man. He 
merely called men's attention to a power that had been 
lying idle, that had been supposed to have no share in the 
higher duties of philosophy. But Bacon would not let 
a man stop with the discovery of a new law of Nature. 
To what use can he put this truth ? How can man's daily 
life be made more comfortable, more civilized, by this new 
knowledge ? These were the questions that Bacon put. 



68 BACON. 

The object of his method was fruit, — the improvement of 
the condition of mankind. He wished man to become 
"the minister and interpreter of Nature." If Bacon could 
look upon the world to-day, he might see his desire ful- 
filled. The uses of steam, the services of electricity, are 
but the fruit for which he pleaded so eloquently. He was 
the inspirer of modern invention and discovery. 

Bacon's great philosophical work was written in Latin, 
and has therefore properly no place in English literature. 
Its plan was elaborate, and the work was never finished. 
Its most important division was the Novum Organum, 
that is, the new instrument, or the new method, to be 
adopted in searching after truth. But it was not in the 
laying down of a specific method that Bacon was useful to 
the world ; it was because he brought philosophy <( home 
to men's business and bosoms," and taught the world the 
doctrine — now so familiar — that Nature and Science are 
the servants of man. 

Bacon's Essays. — Great as the influence of his other writ- 
ings may once have been, Bacon's charm for readers of this 
age lies in the little volume of his Essays. This book is 
one of the classics of the English language. Hallam says, 
"It would be derogatory to a man of the slightest claim 
to polite letters, were he unacquainted with the Essays of 
Bacon." The first edition, containing ten essays, appeared 
in 1597, in that famous decade of English literature which 
produced Shakespeare's comedies and Spenser's Faerie 
Queene. The number of essays grew in time from ten-^o 
fifty-eight. They are short papers, often only a page or 
two in length, but so pressed down and running over with 
thought that the number of their pages is no measure of 
what they contain. (1.) The essays discuss a great variety 
of subjects, for example : Death, Adversity, Atheism, 



BACOK. 69 

Travel, Gardens, Ambition, Friendship. There seemed to 
be no subject which would not stir Bacon's mind to activity, 
and to the production of energetic and original thought. 
(2.) He was, besides, a man so learned that he had vast stores 
of other men's thought to draw from. His familiarity with 
the Bible and with the Greek and Roman classics, his apt 
allusions, quotations, and illustrations enrich every essay. 
Bacon came, in turn, to be quoted oftener than any other 
English essayist. To our own day, every man feels that he 
gives weight to his utterance if he can support it by a sen- 
tence from Bacon. (3.) This constant quotation is due in 
great measure to Bacon's wonderful condensation of 
thought. There is no clearer mark of a powerful intellect 
than such compression. What another man might have 
taken pages to say, Bacon reduced to one portable, useful 
sentence. Material for a score of essays has been found in 
the two pages that he wrote on Studies. (P. 253). (4.) 
Bacon, spite of his practical bent, was a man of imagina- 
tion. Like the age in which he lived, and like his great 
contemporary, Shakespeare, he combined reason and imagi- 
nation, the practical and the ideal. In a bold metaphor we 
often find him conveying an argument ; or under a beauti- 
ful simile may lie the closest reasoning. (t Prosperity," 
says Bacon, ' ' is the blessing of the Old Testament ; adver- 
sity is the blessing of the New. . . . Certainly virtue is 
like precious odors, most fragrant when they are incensed 
or crushed ; for prosperity doth best discover vice, but ad- 
versity doth best discover virtue." 

(5.) The style of Bacon's Essays is that of a note-book : 
short, strong, rugged, abrupt, disjointed. We do not find 
the smoothly gliding sentences of modern English prose. 
Bacon wrote when our prose was young and unformed : his 
style is crude, and at the same time full of bold strength 
and originality. What Ben Jonson said of his speaking 



70 BACOtf. 

was equally true of his written Essays: "No man ever 
spoke more neatly, more pressly, or suffered less emptiness, 
less idleness, in what he uttered." 

Suggestions for Reading : — Bacon's Essays on Truth, Death, 
Adversity, Atheism, Travel, Friendship, Riches, Ambition, Praise, 
Anger ; — Selections from Macaulay's Essay on Bacon; — Whipple's 
Lite fat we of the Age of Elizabeth, — Essays on Bacon; — Saintsbury's 
Elizabethan Literature, page 207. 



Ill this chapter we have considered: — 

1, Prose Writers of the Elizabethan Age* 

2, Bacon's Life, 

3, His Service to Science, 

4, His Essays, 






CHAPTER ¥!♦ 

JOHN MILTON. 

(1608-1674.) 

"0 mighty-mouth'd inventor of harmonies, 
O skill'd to sing of time or eternity ; 
God-gifted organ-voice of England — 
Milton, a name to resound for ages." — Tennyson. 

"The first place among our English poets is due to Milton." — Ad- 
dison. 

" Three poets in three distant ages born, 
Greece, Italy, and England did adorn : 
The first in loftiness of thought surpassed ; 
The next in majesty ; in both the last. 
The force of nature could no further go ; 
To make a third she joined the other two." — Dryden. 

" Was there ever anything so delightful as the music of the Para- 
dise Lost? It is like that of a fine organ ; has the fullest and the 
deepest tones of majesty, with all the softness and elegance of the 
Dorian flute." — Cowper. 

" John Milton was the last of the Elizabethans." — Stop ford Brooke. 

"There are no such vistas and avenues of verse as Milton's. In 
reading Paradise Lost, one has a feeling of spaciousness such as no 
other poet gives. He showed from the first that larger style which 
was to be his peculiar distinction." — Lowell. 

Milton's Contemporaries. — " Thy soul was like a star and 
dwelt apart/' said Wordsworth. This was true of Milton 
in his relation to the literary as well as to the social and 
moral life of his time. He dwelt apart from the other poets 
of the seventeenth century, uninfluenced by them and un- 
appreciated by them. He is never associated with that 



72 MILT OH. 

group of writers who, in their own day, were supposed to 
represent the poetry of their century. He had nothing in 
common with Donne, Waller, and Cowley. These men 
are interesting to the student of the history of English 
poetry ; but in themselves, they are now of little importance 
to the general reader. They had wit, elegance, and musical 
versification, but these qualities, as the history of literature 
proves, are not enough to keep poetry alive. Of the other 
poets of this century, the hymns of " holy George Her- 
bert " are still loved and sung ; Quarles' Emblems is one 
of the curiosities of our libraries ; Herrick's graceful and 
musical verses have, perhaps, a quainter charm than when 
they were first written ; Butler's Hudibras, a witty satire 
upon the Puritans, has brilliant passages and well-known 
lines, but is wearisome reading, as a whole. The great 
John Dryden, as we shall see, belonged to an age of poetry 
altogether different from that of Milton. 

Life. — (1.) John Milton was born December 9, 1608. 
His father was a London scrivener, an able and industrious 
man, who, though a Puritan, was a lover of art and litera- 
ture. He was not long in finding out the wonderful 
promise of his son, and did what few fathers of geniuses 
have done — set the child apart for a literary career, giving 
him a special and careful training. 

"My father destined me, while yet a child," says Milton, "to the 
study of polite literature, which I embraced with such avidity, that 
from the twelfth year of my age I hardly ever retired to my rest from 
my studies till midnight — which was the first source of injury to my 
eyes, to the natural weakness of which were added frequent head- 
aches." 

(2. ) At the age of sixteen Milton was admitted to Christ's 
College, Cambridge, where he led an independent life, 
liking and disliking what he chose, devouring the classics, 



M I L T H . '78 

and the poetry of all literatures, and rejecting the mathe- 
matics and metaphysics that made a large part of a Cam- 
bridge education. While at college he wrote At a Solemn 
Music and the Hymn on the Nativity. 

(3.) Milton went home from Cambridge "regretted by 
most of the Fellows, who held him in no ordinary esteem." 
His father, still watchful of his son's future, secured him 
a life of leisure at Horton, in Buckinghamshire. There, 
in the midst of a quiet and beautiful country, Milton for 
five years led the ideal life of a young poet. His long days 
were spent in reading, study, and the indulgence of his 
passionate love for music. One fancies that 11 Penseroso 
shows Milton in one of his most frequent moods ; and that 
it was he himself who loved to 



-walk unseen 



On the dry, smooth-shaven green ; " 
or sought the 

" arched walks of twilight groves, 



And shadows brown that Sylvan loves." 

"There," he says, 

" In close covert by some brook, 
Where no profaner eye may look, 
Hide me from day's garish eye." 

It was while at Horton that Milton wrote this poem, and 
its beautiful companion, L' Allegro. There he wrote, also, 
Conius, Arcades, and Lycidas. 

(4.) From very early youth, Milton seems to have been 
conscious of a high destiny. He had an exalted sense 
of obligation ; it was as if he bore a divine message, and 
the sacred duty of his "Father's business" were upon 
him. Milton had the self-reliance that in so great a 
genius is sublime, but in common minds is ridiculous and 
offensive. He writes from Horton to his friend Diodati 



74 MILTON. 

that he is "thinking of immortality"; the "wings are 
already growing" that in time are to "soar above the 
Aonian mount." 

(5.) Milton could never have fulfilled such a destiny 
if he had not enlarged his experience beyond the cir- 
cle of Horton. The fortunate young poet took a further 
step in his development when he set out upon a tour of 
the Continent. He visited the great towns of Italy, then 
the centres of art, beauty, and culture. He was furnished 
with influential introductions, and was everywhere wel- 
comed with respect and admiration. He made acquaint- 
ance with the most illustrious men of Europe, among them 
Galileo, "then grown old, a prisoner to the Inquisition." 
At Paris he was entertained by Grotius, "the first of living 
Dutchmen " ; at Florence he was received into the literary 
societies, and gained the praise of wits and scholars by 
his Latin poems and Italian sonnets. His plaus for further 
travel were suddenly abandoned upon the news of the rupt- 
ure between Charles I. and the Parliament ; " for," he 
says, "I thought it base to be traveling for amusement 
abroad while my fellow-citizens were fighting for liberty at 
home." 

(6.) He watched his opportunity to join in the conflict 
that was rending Church and State. Milton's daily occu- 
pation on returning to London, was the teaching of his 
nephews, and the sons of gentlemen who were his intimate 
friends. Meanwhile the political situation grew every day 
more serious, till he could withhold his voice no longer. He 
felt himself commanded by his conscience to "embark in a 
troubled sea of noises and hoarse disputes." He put aside 
his dearest purposes, and for twenty years gave up his life as 
poet for that of pamphleteer. For twenty years he was the 
most powerful writer of the Republican party. Yet "I 
should not choose this manner of writing," said Milton, 
"wherein, knowing myself inferior to myself (led by the 



MILTON. 75 

genial power of nature to another task), I have the use, as 
I may account, but of my left hand/' 

Famous among Milton's prose writings is the noble Areo- 
pagitica ; or, Speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Print- 
ing, an eloquent plea for the freedom of the press. (P. 265). 
He defended the execution of Charles I. in several powerful 
pamphlets. When the restoration of Charles II. was in 
prospect, Milton again put forth a series of pamphlets pro- 
testing against the return of the Stuarts. 

(7.) Milton was a bold thinker on many subjects. In 
1644 he turned his attention to one in which his private 
happiness was involved. In 1643, after a brief courtship, 
he had married Mary Powell, the daughter of an Oxford- 
shire royalist. After one month's experience of the austere 
gloom of a Puritan household, the bride left her unsocial 
husband to his studies, and sought the merriment of her 
father's home. When Milton wrote requesting her to re- 
turn, she ignored his letter ; his messenger she treated un- 
graciously. Making up his mind that his bride had for- 
saken him, he wrote his famous papers in favor of divorce. 
The estrangement continued for two years, and then, learn- 
ing that her husband was about to illustrate his faith in his 
own doctrines by marrying again, Mary Milton repented 
with all due humility. So thoroughly was she forgiven, 
that her husband's house was opened as a refuge for her 
family when the Civil War drove them into poverty and 
distress. 

(8.) In 1649 Cromwell had appointed Milton his Latin 
secretary. All State papers were written in Latin, and the 
office required a man not only of accurate and elegant 
scholarship, but of sound judgment and tact. Milton per- 
formed his duties with zeal and ability, and remained 
secretary to the end of the Commonwealth. While hold- 
ing this office, he undertook the most famous of his contro- 
versies, with the Dutch scholar, Salmasius. Milton's work 



76 MILTOST. 

in the preparation of his argument hastened the loss of 
sight that had threatened him for years. Before 1654 he 
was totally blind. 

Through tracts and letters, Milton had opposed to the 
last the return of the monarchy. The Restoration was the 
signal for his distress and persecution. A proclamation 
was issued against him, and for a time his fate was uncer- 
tain ; but he lived in concealment until the passing of the 
Act of Indemnity placed him in safety. From that time 
till his death he lived in retirement, busily occupied in 
the composition of Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. 
On the 8th of November, 1674, Milton died. He was buried 
in Cripplegate Church-yard. His first wife had died, leav- 
ing him three daughters ; his second, Katharine Woodcock, 
died in 1658, after little more than a year's marriage ; 
but the third, Elizabeth Minshull, whom he espoused in 
1664, survived him for more than half a century. 

Three Periods of his Literary Career. — Milton's literary 
career divides itself into three periods, — that of his youth, 
that of his manhood, and that of his old age. The first 
may be roughly stated as extending from 1623 to 1640 ; 
the second from 1640 to 1660, the date of the Restoration ; 
and the third from the Restoration to the poet's death, in 
1674. During the first of these he produced most of his 
minor poetical works ; during the second he was chiefly 
occupied with his prose controversies ; and in the third we 
see him slowly elaborating the Paradise Lost, the Paradise 
Regained, and the Samson Agonistes. 

The First Period.— (1.) On Christmas morning of 1629, 
at daybreak, Milton conceived the Hymn on the Nativity. 
He was then but twenty-one years of age. This noble 
Christmas hymn, with its grave and elevated subject, the 
beauty of its words, and the music of its verse, was a 



MILTOH. 77 

worthy prelude to Paradise Lost. We see already that 
Milton loved sacred and lofty themes, that the words he 
chose were majestic and lovely ; and we already hear the 
organ music rolling through his verse. In all his poetry, 
a glad event is welcomed with music. So, when Christ is 
born : — 

' ' The helmed cherubim 
And sworded seraphim 
Are seen in glittering ranks with wings display'd, 
Harping in loud and solemn quire, 
With unexpressive notes to Heav'n's new-born Heir. 

Such Music (as 'tis said) 

Before was never made, 
But when of old the sons of morning sung ; 

While the Creator great 

His constellations set, 
And the well-balanc't world on hinges hung, 
And cast the dark foundations deep, 
And bid the welt'ring waves their oozy channel keep. 

Ring out ye crystal spheres, 

Once bless our human ears, 
(If ye have power to touch our senses so), 

And let your silver chime 

Move in melodious time ; 
And let the base of Heav'ns deep organ blow : 
And with your ninefold harmony 
Make up full consort to th' angelic symphony." 

The music of heaven was a favorite theme with Milton. 
The exquisite early poem, At a Solemn Music, again an- 
ticipates Paradise Lost. There he describes the " saintly 
shout and solemn jubilee " of heaven : 

"Where the bright seraphim in burning row 
Their loud uplifted angel trumpets blow, 
And the cherubic host in thousand quires 
Touch their immortal harps of golden wires, 
With those just spirits that wear victorious palms, 
Hymns devout and holy psalms 
Singing everlastingly." 



78 MILTON. 

(2.) The sweet rural sights and sounds of Horton found 
their way into the poems that Milton wrote there. They 
are calm and lovely, rather than sublime and powerful. 
Perhaps the best known and best appreciated of all his 
works are the beautiful companion pieces, II Penseroso and 
L' Allegro. These titles may be translated the thoughtful 
mood and the joyous mood ; and the poems, accordingly, 
describe life, Nature, occupations, and amusements as they 
appear to a man in his gay moments, and then again as 
they look to him in his serious and meditative moods. 
Both are quiet poems : U Allegro is not passionate joy, 
but calm cheerfulness ; II Penseroso is serious, not melan- 
choly. In this they probably show truly the character of 
Milton. L' Allegro is the mood of broad daylight, and be- 
gins gayly with " the dappled dawn," when 

" the lark begins his flight, 



And singing startles the dull night ! " 

And passing through the wholesome pleasures of a country 
day, "till the livelong daylight fail," 

" to bed they creep, 



By whispering winds soon lull'd asleep." 

Music is one of the delights of L' Allegro : 

" And ever against eating cares, 
Lap me in soft Lydian airs, 
Married to immortal verse ; 
Such as the meeting soul may pierce, 
In notes with many a winding bout 
Of linked sweetness long drawn out ; 
With wanton heed, and giddy cunning, 
The melting voice through mazes running ; 
Untwisting all the chains that tie 
The hidden soul of harmony." 

II Penseroso is the mood of twilight and darkness, 






MILTON. 79 

ushered in by the even-song of the nightingale. It is the 
mood of the scholar who would walk unseen : 

' ' Or let my lamp at midnight hour 
Be seen in some high lonely tow'r." 

Puritan though he is, nothing so harmonizes with Mil- 
ton's meditative mood as the subtle influence of a grand 
cathedral : 

" But let my due feet never fail 
To walk the studious cloisters pale, 
And love the high embowed roof, 
With antique pillars, massy proof, 
And storied windows, richly dight, 
Casting a dim, religious light. 
There let the pealing organ blow 
To the full-voic'd quire below, 
In service high, and anthems clear, 
As may with sweetness, through mine ear, 
Dissolve me into ecstasies, 
And bring all Heav'n before mine eyes." 

(3.) The Masque of Comus was written in 1634. It 
was performed by amateur actors, at Ludlow Castle, before 
the family and guests of the Earl of Bridgewater. But 
Comus was written with a deeper purpose than merely to 
amuse a gay company. The ugliness of vice and the love- 
liness and sanctity of virtue is Milton's theme. The lady 
in her angelic purity moves safely through the rabble rout 
of Comus' crew. The central thought of the poem is ex- 
pressed in the lines : — 

" He that has light within his own clear breast 
May sit i' th' centre, and enjoy bright day ; 
But he that hides a dark soul, and foul thoughts, 
Benighted walks under the midday sun ; 
Himself is his own dungeon." 

The poem is dramatic in form, but Milton was lacking 
in dramatic power. He could not create men and women, 



80 MILTON. 

or make them talk and act. The characters of Comus 
all sing rather than speak ; the poem is almost purely 
lyrical. Nothing could surpass the music of its song, the 
beauty of its poetry, or the elevation of its thought. 

(4.) Lycidas is an elegy, a tribute to the memory of a 
college companion. Young Edward King had been lost at 
sea on a voyage to Ireland, and his college friends had 
made up a volume of verse in his memory, to which Mil- 
ton, though not one of his intimate friends, was asked to 
contribute. Lycidas is not an outburst of passionate 
grief ; it is a lament for the death of a youth of promise 
rather than the expression of personal sorrow. The form 
of the poem is that of a Greek pastoral, which, to modern 
taste, is stiff, cold, and affected. Once reconciled to this, 
the reader discovers a poem of rare beauty. The poet 
makes Nature lament the death of the young shepherd : 

' ' the woods, and desert caves, 



With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown, 
And all their echoes mourn." 

He calls upon the vales, and bids them 



-hither cast 



Their bells, and flow'rets of a thousand hues. 
Bid Amaranthus all his beauty shed, 
And daffodillies fill their cups with tears, 
To strew the laureat hearse where Lycid lies." 

Second Period. — For twenty years after writing Lycidas, 
Milton turned aside from poetry. Now and then he wrote 
a sonnet, but his time and thought were almost wholly 
given to the struggle that was going on between the Re- 
public and the Monarchy, between Puritanism and the 
Church of England. Milton was an eager, even an angry, 
partisan, and while, during these years, we may admire the 
eloquence and passionate ardor of the writer, we regret the 



MILTON. 81 

temper of the man. We lament the poet's loss of dignity 
when Milton bursts into a frenzy of invective, -and de- 
nounces his enemy as fool, knave, maniac. 

Most readers of Milton would agree with Mr. Lowell : — 

" His prose is of value because it is Milton's, because it sometimes 
exhibits in an inferior degree the qualities of his verse, and not for its 
power of thought, of reasoning, or of statement. It is valuable, where 
it is best, for its inspiring quality." 

Milton's stately sentences are Latinic in their construc- 
tion, slow and solemn in their movement. His style be- 
longs to a by-gone fashion of English prose, but is a mag-' 
nificent specimen of the old use of the English language. 

The Third Period. — From his early youth it had been 
Milton's purpose to write a great poem. Like Words- 
worth, he looked upon himself as a "dedicated Spirit." 
He searched for many years for the subject he desired ; he 
thought at one time of the story of King Arthur, and 
again meditated some theme from Bible history. The 
Puritans of Milton's time thought and talked much of 
Scripture subjects, and made the language of the Bible 
their daily speech. Undoubtedly their influence drew 
Milton toward a religious subject. Lamartine called 
Paradise Lost " the dream of a Puritan who has fallen 
asleep over the first pages of his Bible." 

When traveling in Italy, Milton, it is said, saw an absurd 
drama whose plot was the story of Adam and his Fall. 
This gave him the hint of a sublime tragedy, which he 
intended to write in imitation of the Greek drama. He 
felt, however, his lack of dramatic power, and found his 
subject expanding steadily in his imagination, till Para- 
dise Lost slowly grew into an epic. During the years 
of political strife, his great purpose was never absent 
from him. No poem has ever been written with more 



82 MILTON. 

solemn deliberation, or with a more sacred sense of respon- 
sibility. It was, says Milton, "a work not to be raised 
from the heat of youth, or the vapours of wine, .... but 
by devout prayer to that eternal Spirit who can enrich 
with all utterance and knowledge, and sends out his Ser- 
aphim with the hallowed fire of his altar to touch and 
purify the lips of whom he pleases." No writer has looked 
to Heaven more devoutly for a blessing on his work. His 
sublime invocation prays : 

"What in me is dark 
Illumine, what is low raise and support ; 
That to the highth of this great argument 
I may assert Eternal Providence, 
And justify the ways of God to men." 

The composition of Paradise Lost occupied about seven 
years, from 1658 to 1665. It was first published in 1667. 
There is no spectacle in the history of "literature more 
touching and sublime than Milton, blind, poor, and per- 
secuted, "fallen upon evil days and evil tongues, in 
darkness and with dangers compassed round," retiring 
into obscurity to compose the immortal epics, Paradise 
Lost and Paradise Regained. It was a sublime courage 
that could 

" argue not 

Against Heav'ns hand or will, nor bate one jot 
Or heart or hope ; but still bear up, and steer 
Right onward." 

" I do not even complain of my want of sight ; in the night with 
which I am surrounded, the light of the divine presence shines with a 
more brilliant lustre. God looks down upon me with tenderness and 
compassion, because I can now see none but himself. Misfortune 
should protect me from insult, and render me sacred ; not because I 
am deprived of the light of heaven, but because I am under the shadow 
of the divine wings, which have enveloped me with this darkness." 

As Milton sat with eyes closed forever upon this world, 



MILTON. 83 

his imagination took perhaps a higher flight than if he had 
had his outward sight. He beheld more vividly the horror 
of " the dark unbottomed infinite abyss," or the serene 
loveliness of Paradise, or the blinding light of Heaven itself. 

The blind old poet, we are told, would compose in his 
mind forty or fifty lines, and would then dictate them to 
his daughters. So his friends would find him, "in a small 
chamber, hung with rusty green, sitting in an elbow chair, 
and dressed neatly in black ; pale, but not cadaverous ; his 
hands and fingers gouty." 

(1.) Paradise Lost (a.) has the advantage of a subject 
that forever concerns every human being — man's struggle 
with evil. The disadvantage of this subject, on the other 
hand, is the fact that Milton's supernatural beings, his 
Heaven and his Hell, require from the reader a greater 
effort of imagination than most men are capable of. In 
this long poem there are no real people or places ; there is 
nothing for a literal reader to fasten upon. He may ad- 
mire detached passages of Paradise Lost, but the poem, as 
a whole, wearies him. Adam and Eve have little reality 
as man and woman. They stand together for humanity. 
The real hero of Paradise Lost is mankind. 

{b.) Without doubt, the most interesting personage is 
Satan, but the 'purpose of Milton was not to trace his fort- 
unes, but those of the human race. The Satan of Milton 
is one of the great creations of literature. He is no vulgar 
devil, but an archangel, though archangel ruined. We see 
him at first splendid in pride, courage, and physical beauty. 

' ' He above the rest 
In shape and gesture proudly eminent, 
Stood like a tow'r ; his form had yet not lost 
All her original brightness, nor appear'd 
Less than archangel ruin'd, and th' excess 
Of glory obscur'd." 

(c.) Not only is Milton's theme sublime, but his Ian- 



84 MILTON. 

guage is equally imposing in its grandeur. His words are 
the most sonorous and impressive that the English tongue 
can furnish. Milton's sensitive ear matched the sound to 
the sense, so that his great poem contains a succession of 
fine musical effects. Says Landor : "After I have "been 
reading the Paradise Lost I can take up no other poet 
with satisfaction. I seem to have left the music of Han- 
del for the music of the street/' 

(d. ) Every page of Milton reminds us of his learning. 
Only a reader familiar with classical and Biblical literature 
feels the full force of his allusions ; and even such a reader 
often has his attention wasted in the effort to trace obscure 
references. This overloading with allusion was an Eliza- 
bethan fault that clung to Milton. 

(2.) Among Milton's friends was Thomas Ellwood, a 
Quaker, and to him Milton one day handed a MS., ask- 
ing him to read it with care. Upon returning it, Ell- 
wood said, " Thou hast said much here of Paradise Lost, 
but what hast thou to say to Paradise Found ? " This ques- 
tion suggested to Milton the writing of Paradise Regained. 
By general consent the second epic is placed far below the 
first in point of interest and variety ; still, it displays much 
of the solemn grandeur and lofty imagination of the earlier 
poem. Christ's Temptation in the Wilderness is the 
theme, and the narrative of that incident, as recorded in 
the fourth chapter of St. Matthew's gospel, is closely fol- 
lowed. This poem is said to have been preferred to the 
grander epic in the esteem of the poet himself. 

(3.) The noble and pathetic tragedy of Samson Ago- 
nistes belongs to the close of Milton's literary career. It is 
constructed according to the strictest rules of the Greek 
drama. In the character of the hero, his blindness, his 
sufferings, and his resignation to the will of God, Milton 
has given a most touching representation of his own old 
age. (P. 261.) 



M I L T ON . 85 

Character of Milton. — Although we know much about 
Milton, we do not know him. Men did not dare approach 
him with their friendship while he lived, and he seems to 
this day almost as difficult of access. He was not a genial, 
lovable man. His blindness or the persecution of his ene- 
mies he could endure with sublime courage, but he could 
not bear the little trials of his own home. We would rather 
forget his family life and remember him only in relation to 
ourselves. In the solitude of his study the poet Milton is 
most impressive. 

" Thy soul was like a star and dwelt apart ; 
Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea — 
Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free; 
So didst thou travel on life's common way 
In cheerful godliness ; and yet thy heart 
The lowliest duties on herself did lay." 

Suggestions for Reading.— Ode on the Nativity, L> Allegro, H 
Penseroso, Camus, Sonnet on his Blindness, Sonnet to Cyrlack Skin- 
ner, upon his Blindness, Paradise Lost, Books I. and IV. — Clarendon 
Press Series, Vol. I.; — Stopford Brooke's Milton; — Selections from 
Macaulay's Essay on Milton /—Selections from Lowell's Essay on 
Milton. 



In this chapter we have considered:— 

1, Milton's Contemporaries, 

2, The IAfe of Milton. 

3, The First Period of his Literary Career, 

4, TJie Second Period, 

5, The Third Period. 

6, Sis Character, 



CHAPTEB ¥H. 

JOHN BUNYAN. 

(1628-1688.) 

"Pilgrim's Progress, in its imagination, fervor, and poetry, and 
in its quality of naturalness, belongs to the spirit of the Elizabethan 
times." — Stopford Brooke. 

" Ingenious dreamer! in whose well-told tale 
Sweet fiction and sweet truth alike prevail ; 
Whose humorous vein, strong sense, and simple style 
May teach the gayest, make the gravest smile ; 
"Witty and well employed, and like thy Lord 
Speaking in parables his slighted word." — Cowper. 

"Though there were many clever men in England during the 
latter half of the seventeenth century, there were only two great cre- 
ative minds. One of those minds produced the Paradise Lost, the 
other, the Pilgrim's Progress." — Macaulay. 

Religious Writers of the Seventeenth Century. — The 

Civil War of the seventeenth century was a religious as 
well as a political contest ; and the prose literature of 
that time exhibits a strong religious character. 

Among the theological writers of the seventeenth cent- 
ury was (1.) William Chillingworth, an eminent defender 
of Protestantism against the Church of Kome. (2.) Sir 
Thomas Browne was a learned physician, who is best 
known as the author of Religio Medici. He is an eccen- 
tric and original writer, quaint in thought and style. (3.) 
Thomas Fuller was a clergyman, who wrote much on re- 
ligious subjects, but who is most famous for his Worthies 
of England. This work consists of biographical notices 
of eminent Englishmen, with descriptions of the scenery, 



BTJNTAN. 87 

antiquities, and other matters of interest connected with, 
their shires. It is a treasury of racy and interesting anec- 
dotes. (4.) Jeremy Taylor was the greatest theological 
writer of the English Church at this period. He was an 
eloquent preacher and writer, a man powerful in argument, 
and lofty and imaginative in style. The critic Jeffrey 
called him "the most Shakespearean of our divines/' (5.) 
Eichard Baxter was an indefatigable writer, but of his one 
hundred and sixty-eight publications, only The Saint's 
Everlasting Rest is now widely known. Of all the re- 
ligious writers of the seventeenth century, the one who in 
our day is most read and loved is John Bunyan. 

Life of Bunyan. — The story of Bunyan's life has helped 
to make him popular. People rejoice in the literary suc- 
cess of a man born and bred so poor, humble, and ignorant. 

He was the son of a Bedfordshire tinker, and followed 
his father's trade until his eighteenth year. He then 
served for a few months in the Parliamentary army. Re- 
turning to his native village, Elstow, he married "one as 
poor as himself." He says that "they had neither dish 
nor spoon betwixt them." Until this time, Bunyan had 
led the ordinary life of a thoughtless, uneducated village 
lad, who saw no harm in swearing, beer-drinking, rough 
sports, and practical jokes. His young wife was a devout 
woman, and she sought his reformation. By inducing 
him' to read two religious books bequeathed to her by a 
dying father, and by leading him to the church of which 
she was a member, she succeeded in awakening his anxiety 
concerning the future life. Once aroused, his sensitive 
and imaginative soul could not rest. For about two years 
his mind was in a state of intense gloom, tormented with 
fears -for his eternal welfare, and perplexed with the re- 
ligious questions of the day. Finally, by what he always 
thought a miracle from Heaven, his soul found peace. 



88 B tT K Y A K . 

The history of his experience he gives in the religious 
autobiography, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, 
written in prison. While he journeyed about the country 
as a tinker, he* told his own story, and preached the way, 
the truth, and the life, that he himself had found. His 
fervent piety and rude eloquence gained him wide reputa- 
tion, and he became a leader among the Baptists. He was 
such a power in the land that the king began to fear him ; 
for all Puritans were regarded by Charles II. as Kepublic- 
ans at heart. In 1660, Bunyan was arrested, and shut up 
in Bedford jail. There he remained twelve years, stead- 
fastly refusing to buy his freedom with the promise not to 
preach. "Will your husband leave preaching?" the 
judge a^ked Bunyan's wife. " My lord," she answered, 
"he dares not leave preaching so long as he can speak." 

These years in prison were spent in working for the sup- 
port of his family, and in writing religious books. Pil- 
grim's Progress was written in Bedford jail, to "divert 
Bunyan's vacant seasons," but was not published until 
1678, when he had left his prison. In 1672, a royal proc- 
lamation of religious toleration was issued, and Bunyan 
was set free. He had already been chosen preacher of the 
Baptist congregation in Bedford, and he now entered zeal- 
ously upon his duties. The fame of his sufferings, his 
genius as a writer, and his power as a speaker, gave him 
unbounded influence in his own church ; while the beauty 
of his character and the liberality of his views won for him 
the esteem of all sects. His labors as preacher and pastor 
extended over the whole region between Bedford and Lon- 
don. He died in London, in 1688, after the exposure and 
fatigue of a journey which he had undertaken for the be- 
nevolent purpose of reconciling a father and son. 

The Pilgrim's Progress from this World to that which is 
to Come relates the experience of a Christian in leaving 



BUKYAK. 89 

behind a life of sin and seeking the life of everlasting 
bliss. 

(1.) Christian, dwelling in the City of Destruction, js 
filled with an agonizing sense of his sinfuhstate, and deter- 
mining to abandon his present life, sets out for the New 
Jerusalem. The adventures of his journey, the scenes 
through which he passes, the friends and fellow-pilgrims 
whom he finds upon the road, are minutely set forth. The 
story is one that a boy may delight in as an exciting tale of 
adventure, or that an old man may read and find therein 
the deepest experiences of his life. It is a book that should 
be read in childhood and again in manhood. 

(2.) The characters of Pilgrim's Progress are rude but 
life-like. They are simply Bunyan's friends and neighbors ; 
they speak and behave like the plain, substantial village 
folk of Bedford. He had a shrewd eye for character, and a 
novelist's skill in portraying the men and women whom he 
saw about him. 

(3.) But Bunyan's purpose was more than to tell an in- 
teresting story or to produce artistic creations of character. 
In all his writing, he is the fervent preacher. He thinks 
only of the need of sinners, never of Bunyan the writer. 
This makes him simple, direct, and appealing. He was 
passionately in earnest, and to his earnestness he added the 
power of a glowing imagination. Much of his inspiration 
he gained from the Bible, which he knew almost by heart. 
He had read but few books ; the Bible and Fox's Booh of 
Martyrs formed his entire library during the twelve years 
of his imprisonment. 

(4.) The Pilgrim's Progress is a book for the common 
people, but the most cultivated taste sees its literary excel- 
lence. Bunyan's style was strong, plain, and clear. Its 
large proportion of Saxon words is noticeable ; it is often 
picturesque and poetical. Macaulay says that "the style 
is delightful to every reader, and invaluable as a study to 



90 BUNYAN. 

every person who wishes to obtain a quick command over 
the English language. The vocabulary is the vocabulary 
of # the common people. There is not an expression, if we 
except a few technical terms of theology, which would puz- 
zle the rudest peasant. We have observed several pages 
which do not contain a single word of more than two sylla- 



(5.) The popularity of Pilgrim's Progress has been re- 
markable. It has been translated into every language 
which contains a religious literature. 

The Holy War, another allegory by Bunyan, tells of the 
siege and capture of the City of Mansoul, and describes the 
strife between sin and goodness in the human spirit. 
• The story is far less interesting than The Pilgrim's Prog- 
ress. (P. 267.) 

Other Famous Books of the Seventeenth Century. — Several 
other famous books belong to the seventeenth century. (1. ) 
Isaac Walton's Compleat Angler is an old favorite. It is a 
book about fishing ; but through it runs a vein of quaint 
and gentle meditation on many themes, and here and there 
are lovely little pictures of sky and brook and meadow. 
(2.) Pepys' Diary is a work that has made the writer im- 
mortal. It covers nine years of the reign of Charles II., 
and in its pages the gay and wicked society of the Eestora- 
tion lives again. It is a book that, like BoswelPs Life of 
Johnson, " draws away the curtain from the Past." Not 
the least interesting feature of Pepys' Diary is the uncon- 
scious revelation of his own character, a piquant mixture of 
shrewdness, vanity, worldly wisdom, and simplicity. (3.) 
Clarendon's History of the Great Rebellion is a royalist's 
history of the Civil War. Clarendon has been called "the 
great cavalier-prince of historical portrait-painters " ; and 
it is for life-like portraits of his famous contemporaries 
that his work is most prized. 



BUNYAK. 91 

Suggestions for Reading. — Pilgrim's Progress, Part I. ; — Macau- 
lay's Essay on Bunyan. 



In this chapter we have considered:— 

1. The Religious Writers of the Seventeenth Century, 

2. Bunyan's Life. 

3. Pilgrim's Progress, 

4. Other Famous Books of the Seventeenth Century, 



CHAPTER ntU 

JOHN DRYDEN. 

(1631-1 700.) 

"Without either creative imagination or any power of pathos, he 
is in argument, in satire, and in declamatory magnificence, the great- 
est of our poets." — O. L. CraiJc. 

' ' I admire Dryden's talents and genius highly ; but his is not a 
poetical genius. The only qualities I can find in Dryden that are 
essentially poetical are a certain ardor and impetuosity of mind with 
an excellent ear. . . . There is not a single image from nature in the 
whole of his works." — William Wordsworth. 

" Behold, where Dryden's less presumptuous car, 
Wide o'er the fields of glory bear 
Two coursers of ethereal race, 

With necks in thunder clothed, and long-resounding pace. 
Hark, his hands the lyre explore ! 
Bright-eyed Fancy, hovering o'er, 
Scatters from her pictured urn 
Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn." — Gray. 

" English prose is indebted to Dryden for having freed it from the 
Cloister of pedantry. He, more than any other single writer, con- 
tributed, as well by precept as example, to give it suppleness of move- 
ment and the easier air of the modern world. His own style, juicy 
with proverbial phrases, has that familiar dignity, so hard to attain, 
perhaps unattainable except by one who, like Dryden, feels that his 
position is assured." — Lowell. 

Life of Dryden. — Milton was the last of the Elizabethan 
poets. In the eighteenth centnry we reach another circle 
of writers, far below the earlier group in power. Between 
these two epochs, with characteristics of the age before 



DRYDEN. 93 

him, and also of the age that came after, stands John 
Dryden. 

Dryden was born and.bred a Puritan. Little is known of 
his early life. Up to the age of twenty-nine he appears to 
have had no thought of becoming a professional author. 
He had written nothing but school-boy translations and 
odes, and an elegy on the death of Cromwell. He had influ- 
ential friends among the Republicans, then in power, and 
looked forward confidently to a political rather than to a 
literary career. But, in 1660, the Puritans lost control of 
the government, Charles II. came back to the throne, and 
Dryden's hopes fell. His only means of support was his pen; 
and he was shrewd enough to see that taste to appreciate 
literary talent, and power to reward it, were both with the 
party of the royalists. It cost him no great effort to aban- 
don his Puritan sentiments, and publish an ode of fervent 
welcome to the returning king. To please Charles II. and 
his court became Dryden's literary ambition. He himself 
says : "I confess my chief endeavors are to delight the age 
in which I live. If the humour of this be for low comedy, 
small accidents, and raillery, I will force my genius to obey 
it." The frivolous society of the Restoration bent its ener- 
gies to the business of amusement, and no other recreation 
was so popular as the theatre. He who could write the most 
acceptable plays, became accordingly the most successful 
literary man. Dryden worked with industry and tact, 
having no scruples against suiting his style and subject to 
the corrupt taste of the time. While he made writing for 
the stage a profession, he occasionally produced a non-dra- 
matic poem. In 1667 he wrote a narrative in verse, entitled 
Annus Mirabilis, or Year of Wonders. It related the 
events of the year 1666, the terrible plague and fire of 
London, and the war with the Dutch. Its flattery of the 
worthless king advanced Dryden's fortunes. In 1670 he 
was appointed Poet Laureate and historian to the king. 



94 DRYDEN. 

The foremost theatrical company made a contract with 
him by which he was to furnish three plays a year. Even 
the rapid, careless pen of Dryden could not, however, keep 
up such speed as this. In thirty-two years he produced 
but twenty-eight plays. Dryden's social advancement 
was rapid. He associated with the favorites at Court ; 
he enjoyed the patronage of the king ; and the prestige 
of his honorable descent, his fine personal appearance, 
and his brilliant talent, won him an earl's daughter for 
a wife. 

He was an admired member of fashionable society, and 
in literary circles was looked up to as an oracle. Social 
and literary successes, however, did not satisfy him. His 
active tastes led him into political controversy, and in 1681 
he wrote the brilliant Absalom and Achitophel. Though 
written in poetical form, it is in reality a political pam- 
phlet, in support of the king's party. The Medal was a 
pamphlet of the same character. In the following year, 
he turned upon his literary enemies in the satire called 
Mac Flecknoe. There was no purpose, in fact, for which 
Dryden did not appear willing to use his ready verse. He 
passed through several changes of religious belief, and at 
each stage he defended himself in an argumentative poem. 
He had been a Puritan, but became at the Eestoration a 
member of the Church of England. In defense of this 
change of opinion, he wrote Religio Laid, an explanation 
of the faith of a layman. In 1686 he forsook the church 
that he had so powerfully defended, and entered the Eoman 
Catholic communion. The sincerity of this conversion has 
often been called in question ; for King James had then 
succeeded Charles II., and was using every effort to re- 
establish the Roman Catholic influence in England. Many 
things, however, tend to prove that Dryden was sincere : 
he kept his new creed, when the Protestant William and 
Mary came to the throne, although he suffered not a little 



DRYDEN. '95 

for his faith ; he carefully educated his children in the 
venerable Church of Home ; and he wrote his Hind and 
Panther in sympathy with her reverses. 

The Eevolution of 1688, by which William and Mary 
were placed upon the throne of England, deprived Dryden 
of his Laureateship. The Protestant Court did not smile 
upon the Catholic poet. But poverty, advancing age, fail- 
ing health, and the malice of exultant foes, proved power- 
less to impair his energy ; and his last years were the most 
illustrious of his literary career. He continued to write 
for the stage until 1694; but after that year he busied 
himself chiefly with translation. His poetical versions of 
Juvenal, Persius, and Virgil appeared in 1693 ; and in the 
last year of his life he wrote his Fables, a series of render- 
ings from Chaucer and Boccaccio. 

For twelve years Dryden had lived poor and neglected ; 
yet when he died, in 1700, evidence of the high esteem in 
which he was held was promptly given. While his family 
was preparing to bury him in a style suited to humble cir- 
cumstances, a large subscription was raised to give him the 
tribute of an imposing funeral. His body was conveyed in 
state to Westminster Abbey, and was interred between the 
tombs of Chaucer and Cowley. 

The Growth of Dryden. — Critics have justly said that 
Dryden, more than any other poet, would gain apprecia- 
tion from a chronological survey of his writings. In 
power of thought and expression, he was a man of steady 
growth. In his early years he wrote his poems and dramas 
to please a corrupt age ; his best dramas, his thoughtful 
criticisms, his satires, translations, and odes — in short, all 
those works that show the higher qualities of his mind — 
were written in' the dignified maturity of his manhood, or 
in his noble old age. This change in his writings reflected 
the change that went on in his character. He acquired 



96" DRYDBN. 

dignity and manliness, moral courage and modesty. Dur- 
ing the last years of his life, though neglected by fashion- 
able society, Dryden reigned supreme in literary circles. 
He held his court at Will's Coffee-house, and was sur- 
rounded by young writers, who were absorbing his pre- 
cepts, and were preparing to hand them down to the next- 
age. Pope, a lad of twelve, caught a peep at the great 
Mr. Dryden as he sat at Will's. Addison wrote his first 
boy-poem in honor of Dryden. Swift showed some of his 
own verses to the great man, and never forgave Dryden 
because he told the youth plainly, " Cousin Swift, you will 
never be a poet." Will's was long after the rallying-place 
of the wits. " If they had but once had the honor to dip 
a finger and thumb in Mr. Dryden's snuff-box, it was 
enough to inspire 'era to write Verse as fast as a tailor 
takes stitches." Dryden was a literary dictator like Ben 
Jonson before him, and like Samuel Johnson years after. 

Non-dramatic Poems. — In Dryden, reason was much more 
active than imagination. He loved nothing so well as an ar- 
gument. His thoughts were strong, vigorous, and sensible ; 
but they were seldom poetic. The beauty that touched and 
delighted him was the beauty of a fine piece of reason- 
ing, a brilliant epigram, a neat bit of characterization. The 
thought of his poems is weighty and valuable, but it is prose 
thought. Dryden's subjects condemn him as a poet. W T hat 
right has poetry to meddle with political quarrels, with theo- 
logical debates, or with literary squabbles ? Poetry is for 
higher uses. The marvel is that what another man finds 
sufficiently difficult to express in prose, Dryden attempts in 
verse. Perhaps the most difficult species of writing known 
is abstract reasoning in poetical form ; yet Dryden moves 
without strain or effort through his heroic couplets, as if 
they were his natural speech. His satire was keen, merci- 
less, and brilliant. No one surpasses him in striking off a 






DEYDBN. 97 

telling sketch of an enemy. Villiers, Duke of Bucking- 
ham, had written a witty play called The Rehearsal, which 
ridiculed Dryden's dramas. Dryden had his revenge. In 
one of his satires he draws this portrait of Villiers : 

" In the first rank of these did Zimri stand, 
A man so various that he seemed to be 
Not one, but all mankind's epitome ; 
Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong, 
Was everything by starts and nothing long; 
But in the course of one revolving moon 
Was chymist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon; 
Blest madman, who could every hour employ 
With something new to wish or to enjoy ! 
Railing and praising were his usual themes, 
And both, to show his judgment, in extremes: 
So over violent orover civil 
That every man with him was God or Devil. 
In squandering wealth was his peculiar art ; 
Nothing went unrewarded but desert. 
Beggared by fools whom still he found too late, 
He had his jest, and they had his estate. 
He laughed himself from Court ; then sought relief 
By forming parties, but could ne'er be chief ; 
Thus wicked but in will, of means bereft, 
He left not faction, but of that was left." 

Dryden had undoubtedly one gift of the poet — an ear 
for music. This gift he used to our delight in his odes. 
Alexander's Feast will not bear a close examination as po- 
etry, hut as a musical composition it is exquisite. Every 
year some poet wrote an ode for the festival of St. Cecilia, 
the patroness of music. Dryden composed one in 1687, 
and ten years later wrote his more famous Alexander's 
Feast. Dryden's versification, we may here add, was, more 
than any other feature of his writing, admired and imitated 
by the poets that followed him. As Pope declares, 

"Dryden taught to join 
The varying verse, the full-resounding line, 
The long majestic march, and energy divine," 



98 DEYDEN. 

Dry den's Plays. — Nearly a hundred years had passed 
since the plays of the Elizabethan drama were written. 
A change had meanwhile taken place in public taste, and 
in what was written to please it. 

" The stage but echoes back the public voice; 
The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give, 
For we that live to please, must please to live." 

These words of Dr. Johnson are never truer than when 
applied to the Drama of the Restoration. The aim of 
Shakespeare and his fellow- writers had been to portray the 
human nature common to high and low, rich and poor, to 
all lands and to all ages. The drama that followed the 
Restoration took its material, not from Nature, but from 
Society. It produced pompous tragedy ; gay, witty, and 
affected comedy. A corrupt society found any play tame 
and insipid that was not highly spiced with immorality. 
These plays are repulsive to the purer modern taste. They 
are meeting the punishment that they deserve : few of them 
are either acted or read. To modern readers, Wycherley, 
Vanbrugh, Farquhar, Oongreve, are hardly more than 
names. They were "of an age," not, like Shakespeare, 
"for all time." Dry den was one of the men who degraded 
his talents to please a corrupt taste. He was very popular, 
but it was not because of his fine delineation of character, 
his humor, or his pathos. His comedies were full of in- 
genious but coarse situations and indecent wit. His trag- 
edies were filled with bombastic declamation. He was 
always able to catch the ear of the public with his graceful 
versification. 

The shamelessness of the stage did not go unrebuked. 
A sturdy clergyman, Jeremy Collier, faced the scorn of 
play-goers, and presented himself as the champion of de- 
cency. He wrote a fiery and witty pamphlet entitled A 
Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the En- 



DRYDEK. 99 

glish Stage, in which lie attacked Wycherley, Congreve, 
and Dryden. Dryden showed a manly and generous spirit 
in hii acknowledgment of the justice of Collier's charges. 
In one of his prefaces he said : 

1 ' I shall say less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he has 
taxed me justly ; and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts and ex- 
pressions of mine which can be truly argued of obscenity, profane- 
ness, or immorality, and retract them. If he be my enemy, let him 
triumph ; if he be my friend, as I have given him no personal occasion 
to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance." 

The manliness of Dryden is seen in the courage with 
which he several times changed his mind. He was, indeed, 
a man upright and respectable in his private life. "His 
indelicacy/' said Walter Scott, "was like the forced impu- 
dence of a bashful man." In his later years, a closer study 
of the Shakespearean writers led Dryden to a juster view 
of the province of the drama. He returned to the use of 
blank verse, and developed considerable power in portray- 
ing passion and character. In the preface of All for Love, 
the poet thus acknowledges the source of his inspiration : 
"In my style I have professed to imitate the divine Shake- 
speare I hope I may affirm, and without vanity, 

that by imitating him I have excelled myself." 

Dryden's Translations. — (1.) Dryden's version of Virgil's 
JEneid is the most famous of his translations. An author 
and his translator should be congenial in taste and method ; 
but Dryden and Virgil were by no means kindred spirits. 
Virgil was delicate and graceful ; Dryden, big, careless, 
and powerful. But if he did not reproduce Virgil's spirit, 
he produced a poem which, though scholars may not ap- 
prove it, has nevertheless been the most popular transla- 
tion of Virgil. (P. 275.) 

(2.) The same lack of sympathy between the two poets 



100 DRIDEN. 

made Dryden incapable of modernizing Chaucer. He 
turned several of Chaucer's stories into more modern En- 
lish ; but, though these versions were popular in Dry^ien's 
time, the nineteenth century prefers to read Chaucer in 
the original. 

Dry den's Prose Writings are in the form of critical 
essays, prefaces, or dedications prefixed to his various 
works. (1.) He was an intelligent critic for the time at 
which he wrote ; criticism being then in an undeveloped 
state. Many of Dryden's theories and judgments now ap- 
pear commonplace or utterly wrong ; but, when he wrote, 
he exerted a good influence in leading people to think about 
what they read. Whether we accept his opinions or not, 
what Dry den says always has point. (P. 279.) 

(2.) Dryden's prose has the same vigor and ease that has 
been noticed in his poetry. It is, moreover, better English 
prose than we have found before, and carries English liter- 
ature a step farther towards the excellence of modern prose. 
He brought his critical powers to bear upon his own ex- 
pression, and had the good sense to see that an uninfected 
language like the English, which shows the relation of 
words by their place in the sentence, not by their form, 
requires a short, simple, straightforward sentence as the 
foundation of its style. As Dryden marks a transition in 
poetry, so in prose he marks the transition from the in- 
volved, ornate periods of Milton to the easy, familiar 
prose of Addison. The movement in poetry, with which 
he is connected, was bad ; the movement in prose was 
good. 

Suggestions for Reading. — Annus Mirabilis, Selections from 
Absalom and Achitophd, Lines to Mistress Anne Killigrew, A Song 
for St. Cecilia's Day, Alexander's Feast; — Lowell's Essay on Dryden; 
— Selections from Macaulay's Essay on Dryden. 






DRYDEK. 101 

In this chapter we have considered: — 

1. Life of Dry den. 

2. The Growth of JDryden. 

3. Non-dramatic Poems, 

4. Plays. 

5. Translations. 

6. Prose Writings. 



CHAPTEH IX. 

ALEXANDER POPE. 

(1688-1744.) 

' ' That clever creature, that quintessence of soul, that drop of 
clear spirit in cotton wool." — Sainte-Beuve. 

" In Pope I cannot read a line, 
But with a sigh I wish it mine ; 
When he can in one couplet fix 
More sense than I can do in six, 
It gives me such a jealous fit, 
I cry, ' Pox take him and his wit ! ' " — Sivift. 

" King Alexander had great merit as a writer, and his title to the 
kingdom of wit was better founded than his enemies have pretended." 
— Henry Fielding. 

" If Pope must yield to other poets in point of fertility of fancy, 
yet in point of propriety, closeness, and elegance of diction he can 
yield to none." — Joseph Warton. 

"<Pope's rhymes too often supply the defect of his reasons." — Rich- 
ard Whately. 

"As truly as Shakespeare is the poet of man as God made him, 
dealing with great passions and innate motives, so truly is Pope the 
poet of society, the delineator of manners, the exposer of those mo- 
tives which may be called acquired, whose spring is in institutions 
and habits of purely worldly origin." — J. R. Lowell. 

The Augustan Age was the name given to the epoch of 
literature immediately following the time of Dryden. It 
is also called the Age of Queen Anne, though its writers 
did some of their best work during the reign of George I. 

There was little that was new, exciting, or adventurous 
in the age of Anne. The Elizabethan age was creative, 



pope. 103 

and produced new ideas ; the age of Anne contented itself 
with an admirable restatement of old ideas. Pope's Essay 
on Criticism is an example. 

" The poet's eye in a fine frenzy rolling, 
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven," 

described the Elizabethan poet ; but the cool and critical 
Augustan poet thought "a fine frenzy" quite unnecessary, 
and liable to lead to countless blunders and absurdities. 
Dr. Johnson said that Shakespeare had not six lines to- 
gether without a fault. When Pope was a boy, "the 
knowing Walsh " told him that the English had had several 
great poets, but never any one great poet who was correct. 
Walsh struck the key-note of Pope's ambition, and of the 
poetry of his age. 

Writers not only looked closely to the correctness of their 
poetry — they carried their critical instinct into every de- 
partment of life. Criticism in politics took the form of 
virulent pamphlets ; literary criticism produced such 
spiteful satires as Pope's Dunciad, while society sparkled 
with satirical epigrams. The atmosphere was withering to 
true poetry and to noble inspiration. 

We find prose matter and poetical form continually 
combined. Addison, when he wished to write a critical 
Account of the Principal English Poets, wrote it in rhym- 
ing verses of ten syllables — the heroic couplet that was 
a feature of the age. Pope laid down the principles 
of rhetoric in the same metre. We saw in Dryden the 
beginning of this kind of poetry. He was the master to 
whom the following age looked up. His sound sense, 
clearness of statement, and harmonious verse, were ad- 
mired and imitated. His followers aspired, however, to 
greater neatness and elegance, and succeeded in giving 
poetry a higher polish than it had ever before attained. 
They Avere satisfied with the result. They never doubted 



104 POPE. 

that the great period of English literature had at last 
arrived, and without hesitation they named it the Augus- 
tan Age. 

The influences of this age were not altogether bad. 
Writing came to be looked on as a fine art, which a man 
could not pursue without care and training. War was 
waged on "the mob of gentlemen that write with ease/' 
— as Pope called them. A young enthusiast was not to rush 
into print with his first shapeless productions : he was to 
learn to wait patiently ; to let his poem lie still and ripen ; 
to allow his standards of excellence to mature ; to submit 
to criticism of judicious friends ; to keep in view always 
his responsibility as an artist. Such were the teachings of 
the 'Augustan Age. Clearness became the first duty of the 
writer, and condensation the second. Pope summed up in 
himself the excellences and the faults of his time ; he was 
most strongly influenced by his age, and was in turn the 
strongest influence upon other writers. 

Life of Pope. — Pope was born in London, and was of 
Roman Catholic parentage. His father was a well-to-do 
merchant, who had acquired sufficient property to retire 
from business and to enjoy the leisure of his country home 
near Windsor. Pope was a sickly child, so deformed that 
he called his life "that long disease." Unluckily, he could 
not be sent to school, and missed the rough-and-tumble asso- 
ciation with noisy, healthy boys. If he had been a boy 
among boys, he would have been a man among men. By 
the time he was twelve, he had become a literary young 
gentleman of talent and leisure. The books he liked 
best were the poems of Waller, Spenser, and Dryden. (1.) 
Before this, he had himself begun to write. He said years 
after : 

" As yet a child, and all unknown to fame, 
I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came." 



POPE. .105 

His Ode to Solitude, written at the age of twelve, is re- 
markably thoughtful. The verses of the precocious boy 
were handed about among literary men, who had their 
share in spoiling him. His parents' most absorbing occu- 
pation was to watch the unfolding of his wonderful mind. 
His father assigned him subjects for his poems, and was 
his first reader and critic. These early poems are of little 
interest in themselves. It was not till the Essay on Criti- 
cism appeared in 1711, that Pope deserved any fame. The 
poem was written when he was twenty-one, and was pub- 
lished two years later. It marked the beginning of a most 
prosperous and successful literary career. Whatever he 
wrote was received with interest and applause. One of his 
early poems was The Epistle of Eloisa to Abelard ; another 
was the famous Rape of the Lock. Pope's literary career 
has been divided into three periods : that of his early 
poems, of which several have been mentioned ; second, the 
ten years of his middle life, devoted to translation ; and 
third, his later years, in which he wrote his moral and 
satirical poems. 

(2.) The translation of Homer was the most serious piece 
of work that Pope engaged in. It was a bold commercial 
undertaking, and proved a remarkable success. Subscrip- 
tions poured in when the work was but just begun, show- 
ing the confidence of the public in the translator's ability. 
Pope was the first author in the history of English litera- 
ture who made a fortune with his pen. His profit from 
the translation of Homer was at least £9,000. It enabled 
him to purchase his villa at Twickenham, and, quoting 
his own words, to 



■maintain a poet's dignity and ease, 



And see what friends, and read what books I please." 

(3.) The third period of his literary life was passed at 
Twickenham, a pretty suburb of London, lying a few miles 



106 pope. 

up the river, on the banks of the Thames. Pope had an 
eager interest in the newly-developed art of landscape gar- 
dening, and produced wonders, his friends tell us, with his 
little five acres of land. Says Horace Walpole, "Pope 
had twisted and twirled and rhymed and harmonized this, 
till it appeared two or three sweet little lawns, opening and 
opening beyond one another, and the whole surrounded 
with impenetrable woods/' Pope's grotto at Twickenham 
was famous. It was fitted up with many little mirrors, 
that flashed the light in every direction, and reflected the 
coral, crystals, petrifactions, and marbles that his friends 
sent to him. 

At Twickenham Pope wrote the Dunciad, the Essay on 
Man, and his epistles. In spite of his feeble health, he 
lived to the age of fifty-six. When a young man in Lon- 
don, Sir Joshua Eeynolds, the great portrait painter, saw 
Pope, and said of him : 

"He was about four feet six inches high, very humpbacked and 
deformed. He wore . a black coat, and, according to the fashion of 
that time, had on a little sword. He had a large and very fine eye, 
and a long, handsome nose; his mouth had those peculiar marks 
which are always found in the mouths of crooked persons, and the 
muscles which run across the cheek were so strongly marked that they 
seemed like small cords." 

Pope was so little that a high chair was needed for him 
at the table, so weak and sickly that he could not stand 
unless tied up in bandages, so sensitive to the cold that he 
was wrapped in flannels and furs, and had his feet encased 
in three pairs of stockings. His deformity gave him the 
nicknajne of "The Interrogation Point." 

In dress and manners Pope was fastidious and elegant. 
He was a polished man of the world. 

Pope's Friends. — He had many friends and many ene- 
mies, for he was both loving and quarrelsome. He was 



pope. 107 

most lovable in his relation to his fond old mother, to 
whom he was the best of sons. Until her death, he was 
still her child, her "deare." She petted and praised him 
to the last, and fed his vanity with her loving flattery. He 
was as sensitive to praise as to ridicule, and this doting 
mother, always at his ear, had no small influence upon his 
character. The applause of a friend like Swift was not 
good for Pope. "When you think of the world, give it 
one more lash at my request/'' Dean Swift would say. He 
made an intimate friend of the brilliant, dashing, and un- 
principled St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke. It was to 
Bolingbroke that Pope addressed the four epistles forming 
the Essay on Man. Pope's friendship and quarrel with 
Addison are famous. There is much gossip about it in the 
biographies, but we hardly need to know more than the 
characters of the two men to account for their unfriendli- 
ness. Addison was a man of dignified self-respect, and 
Pope a man of irritable self-esteem ; there is always a clash 
when these two characters meet. Another quarrel was 
with the famous letter- writer, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. 
She was a witty, brilliant woman, and quite a match for 
Pope. "The Wicked Wasp of Twickenham" was her 
name for him. 

Character. — Pope was an invalid, and more or less of. a 
genius, and he had all the faults that belong to both char- 
acters. The invalid and the man of genius are full of 
contradictions ; and Pope, with all his unmanly irritability 
and vanity, had, nevertheless, his moments of deep devo- 
tional feeling and genuine moral elevation. There is no 
reason to doubt the piety of his hymns, or to reject as in- 
sincere many a noble thought in his poems. It is also to 
be remembered that whatever Pope attained in life, he won 
by pure energy and intellect. Let us admire the courage 
and the will that against such odds achieved such results. 



108 pope. 

Essay on Criticism. — This is perhaps the most remark- 
able poem ever written by a youth of twenty-one. We 
find in Pope not a trace of youthful folly. He is from the 
first discreet, sententious, and self-contained. He never 
claimed for the Essay originality of thought. The poem 
is described by his own verse : 

" What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed." 

Many lines of the Essay on Criticism have become fa- 
mous. The expression is often so neat, vigorous, and 
sparkling, that it becomes fixed in the memory, and even 
embedded in our common speech. 

" Fools rush in where angels fear to tread." 
" A little learning is a dangerous thing." 
" To err is human, to forgive divine." 

Such verses strike the ear and linger in the memory, 
partly because of their agreeable sound. Pope in his Essay 
lays down the principle, 

" The sound must seem an echo to the sense." 

The Essay on Criticism is not, however, faultless. 
Pope's exquisiteness of finish has been overpraised. His 
thought rambles, he falls into dull, prosy sentences, and 
often uses a faulty rhyme. 

The Rape of the Lock. — Lord Petre, a young gallant at 
the Court of Queen Anne, carried his admiration for the 
beautiful Miss Arabella Fermor so far as to cut off slyly 
one of her lovely ringlets. The young lady's family re- 
sented this as a serious act of impertinence. It was sug- 
gested to Mr. Pope that a trifle from his pen might laugh 
the matter off, and restore good feeling. The poem was 
the delight of fashionable circles. Addison called it "a 



POPE. 109 

delicious little thing/ ' and critics ever since have agreed in 
thinking it the best mock-heroic poem in the language. 
The fun of the thing consists in treating an absurd little 
incident in solemn epic style. Pope was never more origi- 
nal, never showed more fancy, than when he invented the 
guardian sylphs, "the thousand bright inhabitants of air," 
that attend on Belinda. The Rape of the Loch is a trifle, 
but perfect in its way. 

Translation of Homer. — The criticism of Bentley, when 
he read Pope's translation of the Iliad, leaves nothing 
more to be said : " It is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you 
must not call it Homer." That Pope should undertake a 
translation of Homer without a knowledge of Greek, shows 
the ignorance of the age for which he wrote. The work 
was greatly admired, and had a strong influence on the 
poetry that followed. It set the fashion of a poetical dic- 
tion remote from that of every-day life. When Homer 
mentions an ass, Pope cannot bring himself to write the 
word: he transforms it into "the slow beast with heavy 
strength endued." It became the peculiarity of Pope's 
imitators never to call a thing by its simple name. A boot 
became "the shining leather that encased the limb" ; a 
caterpillar, "the crawling scourge that smites the leafy 
plain." After all, Pope's Homer is very pleasant reading. 
It is smooth and flowing, spirited and rapid. This book 
has been from Pope's own day "the delight of generous 
boys." It was the first poetry that Walter Scott read, and 
was the delight of Byron's boyhood. 

The Dunciad. — Pope's brilliant success, his popularity, 
the tinge of vanity and malignity in his disposition, and 
above all, the supercilious tone in which he speaks of other 
authors, raised around him a swarm of enemies, animated 
alike by envy and revenge. Determining, therefore, to 



110 POPE. 

inflict upon these scribblers a punishment that they 
would remember, he composed the Dunciad, the fiercest, 
most sweeping, and most powerful satire of English liter- 
ature. The Dunciad is remarkable for its wit and its work- 
manship, but genius was never put to a more unworthy use. 
The satires and epistles of Pope show his intellect at its 
best. The Epistle to Dr. Arouthnot deserves a careful 
reading. 

Essay on Man. — Whatever his master, Dryden, had done 
before him, that Pope in turn attempted . Dryden had 
modernized Chaucer, and Pope had tried to do the same ; 
both undertook laborious translations ; and both wrote 
literary satires. As Dryden had won his greatest fame by 
his skill in reasoning in verse, Pope made a bold attempt 
to follow him in his Essay on Man. The poem is one that 
is remembered and valued in fragments rather than as a 
complete work. It contains lofty and brilliant passages, 
and many a line so condensed in thought, and so neat and 
apt in expression, that it has come down to us as a proverb. 
Pope, in fact, has furnished more familiar quotations than 
any other author except Shakespeare. The Essay on Man 
supplies a large number : — 

" Heaven from all creatures hides the book of fate." 

"Hope springs eternal in the human breast: 
Man never is, but always to be blest." 

"Honor and shame from no condition rise; 

Act well your part, there all the honor lies." 
"Know then thyself, presume not God to scan, 

The proper study of mankind is Man." 

Over all Pope's poetry is the charm of the smoothest 
versification. His heroic couplets have become monot- 
onous to our ear, but to the taste of his own age they were 
novel and delightful. (P. 289.) 



POPE. Ill 

The Critics of Pope are too much inclined to tell us what 
he is not, rather than what he is.. Here, for instance, is a 
typical criticism : — 

"His poetry had not the naturalness and simplicity of Chaucer's, 
the universality of Shakespeare's, the majestic and solemn earnestness 
of Milton's, or even the freedom and breadth of Dryden's. It never 
touched the national heart like the poetry of Cowper and Burns."' 

It would be more profitable to sum up the positive merits 
of Pope. His poetry is a keen intellectual pleasure to 
many of the best minds, because of his wit and brilliant 
good sense, his vivid pictures of the world in which he 
lived, his skill in expression, and his matchless versifica- 
tion. 

Suggestions for Reading. — An Essay on Criticism, — TJie Rape of 
the Lock, — Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot ; — Ward's English Poets, — Essay 
on Pope ; — Lowell's Essay on Pope ; — Thackeray's English Humorists, 
— Lecture on Pope. 



In this chapter we have considered: — 

1. TJie Augustan Age. 

2. The IAfe of Pope. 
S. His Friends. 

4:. His Character. 

5. The Essay on Criticism. 

6. TJie Rape of the Lock. 

7. Translation of Homer. 

8. The JDunciad. 

9. TJie Essay on Man. 
10. The Critics of Pope. 



CHAPTEH X. 

JOSEPH ADDISON. 
(1672-1'719.) 

"Give days and nights, sir, to the study of Addison, if you mean 
to be a good writer, or, what is more worth, an honest man." — Sam- 
uel Johnson. 

•"The great satirist who alone knew how to use ridicule without 
abusing it, who without inflicting a wound effected a great social 
reform, and who reconciled wit and virtue after along and disastrous 
separation, during which wit had been led astray by profligacy, and 
virtue by fanaticism." — T. B. Macaulay. 

' ' [Steele in the Tatter] paints as a social humorist the whole age of 
Queen Anne — the political and literary disputes, the fine gentlemen 
and ladies, the characters of men, the humours of society, the new 
book, the new play ; we live in the very streets and drawing-rooms 
of old London." — Stopford Brooke. 

Introduction. — Modern English prose began to develop 
under the influence of Dryden, and continued, in the 
eighteenth century, to increase in grace and power. Be- 
fore the year 1700, if a man wished to write what should 
be imperishable, he used Latin prose or composed a poem. 
It may be said that Addison did for English prose what 
Chaucer did for the English language : he gave it a liter- 
ary position ; he won for it the respect of writers and read- 
ers. With its development, we may trace the growth of 
the novel, the history, the essay, and the biography, forms 
of writing of which little is heard before the Age of Queen 
Anne. 

Early Life of Addison. — It was Joseph Addison who first 
made English prose simple, easy, natural, and yet dignified. 



: 



ADDISON. 113 

His father, Lancelot Addison, was a clergyman of some 
reputation for learning. He sent his son to the Charter- 
house, a famous London school ; and there the lad and his 
playfellow, "Dick" Steele, became fast friends. Addison 
afterwards entered Magdalen College, Oxford, where he 
was distinguished for his scholarship, and especially for his 
skill in writing Latin verses. 

Among his earliest English poems, was An Account of 
the Principal English Poets. This has no value save as a 
relic of the literary taste of that age. It was a generation 
that pitied Chaucer and Spenser, and omitted Shakespeare 
altogether from the roll of the great poets. Addison's 
Address to Dry den was poor enough poetry, but it served 
to win Dryden's friendship. The old poet was translating 
Virgil, and Addison, proud to give him his modest help, 
wrote the arguments for the books of the ^Eneid. Dry den 
was then old and poor, and there is something pleasant in 
the fact that the old poet was cheered and supported by the 
fresh young admiration of Addison. Some complimentary 
verses to King William, aided by the influence of Lord 
Halifax, gained him the reward of £300 a year. He at 
once departed for the Continent, and traveled in France 
and Italy, till the death of King William put an end to 
his pension and summoned him home. On his return to 
London, we hear of him as "indifferently lodged" over a 
little shop, up three pairs of stairs. But he was a man of 
temper like that of Hamlet's friend Horatio : — 

' ' A man that fortune's buffets and rewards 
Hath ta'en with equal thanks ; and blest are those 
Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled 
That they are not a pipe for Fortune's finger 
To sound what stop she please." 

Happily, at this crisis, the Duke of Marlborough won 
the Battle of Blenheim, and Anne's minister, Codolphin, 



114 ADDIS OK. 

determined that it should be celebrated in a poem. Hali- 
fax was consulted, and named his friend Addison as a liter- 
ary man of promise. Godolphin's messenger accordingly 
climbed the three nights of dark stairs to the poet's garret, 
and gave the order for the poem. Addison's Campaign 
was soon the talk of the towr% " A large prize poem that 
won an enormous prize/' Thackeray calls it. Its author 
was soon made Under-Secretary of State, and afterwards 
Chief Secretary for Ireland. The reception of Hie Cam- 
paign paved the way for further literary successes. Addi- 
son brought out his Travels in Italy ; he helped Steele 
write a play called The Drummer ; he himself wrote the 
opera of Rosamond. Italian opera had lately been intro- 
duced into England, to the disgust of people of sober 
tastes, like Addison. He determined to show London that 
sensible English words were capable of being set to music 
for the stage. His opera was, however, a failure : its mu- 
sic was poor, and it had no dramatic merit. 

The Tatler. — TJp to this point, Addison's literary career 
had been respectable, but not distinguished. While he 
was in Ireland, an enterprise was undertaken in England 
which was destined to reveal his powers. We might never 
have discovered him to be a charming moralist and humor- 
ist if his friend Steele had not established The Tatler. 
Addison and Steele had been school-boys together, then 
fellow-students at Oxford, and now were warm friends and 
literary co-workers. What more natural than that Steele 
should call in his friend's aid in a new undertaking ? 

It happened that Steele, having done the government 
good service with his pen, was rewarded with the office of 
Gazetteer: that is, he was given the exclusive privilege of 
publishing official news. This suggested to him a very 
original project. He determined to found a new species of 
periodical, which should contain the news of the day and 



ADDISON. 115 

a series of light and agreeable essays upon topics of general 
interest, likely to improve the taste, the manners, and 
the morals of society. It should be remarked that this was 
a period when literary taste was at its lowest ebb among the 
middle and fashionable classes of England. The amuse- 
ments, when not merely frivolous, were either immoral or 
brutal. Gambling, even among women, was prevalent. The 
sports of men were marked with cruelty and drunkenness. 
In such a state of society intellectual pleasures and acquire- 
ments were regarded either with wonder or with contempt. 
The fops and fine ladies actually prided themselves on their 
ignorance of spelling, and any allusion to books was scouted 
-as pedantry. Such was the disease which Steele desired to 
cure. 

" The general purpose of this paper," said The Tatter, 
" is to expose the false arts of life, to pull off the disguises 
of cunning vanity and affectation, and to recommend a 
general simplicity in our dress, our discourse, and our be- 
havior/'' When we honor Addison as a reformer, we must 
remember that it was Steele who made him one. No man 
better appreciated their relations than the generous, large- 
hearted Steele himself. " I fared," he said, "like a dis- 
tressed prince, who calls in a powerful neighbor to his aid 
— I was undone by my auxiliary. When I had once called 
him in, I could not subsist without dependence on him."" 
We never detect in Steele a shade of envy of his more 
gifted friend ; his loyalty to Addison was almost romantic 
in its devotion. 

The name Tatter, Steele explained, was "invented in 
honor of the "fair sex," for whose entertainment especially 
the paper was intended. It was a small, penny sheet, ap- 
pearing three *times a week, each number containing a 
short essay, a few bits of news, and some advertisements. 
The popularity of the new journal was great ; no tea-table, 
no coffee-house, was without it ; and the authors, writing 



116 ADDISON. 

with ease, pleasantry, and knowledge of life, — writing as 
men of the world, rather than as literary recluses, soon 
gained the attention of the people whom they addressed. 
TJie Tatler was published for nearly two years — from April 
12, 1709, till January 2, 1711. By that time Steele had 
lost his position as Gazetteer. 

The Spectator. — A few weeks after TJie Tatler ceased, 
TJie Spectator began its career. It appeared six times a 
week, and reached a circulation that was extraordinary for 
that day. Its aim was the same as that of The Tatler. 
Said TJie Spectator : — 

"It was said of Socrates that he brought Philosophy down from 
heaven to inhabit among men ; and I shall be ambitious to have it 
said of me that I have brought Philosophy out of closets and libra- 
ries, schools and colleges, to dwell in clubs and assemblies, at tea- 
tables and in coffee-houses." 

Addison's ambition appears to have been gratified, for 
in the ninety-second Spectator is a letter signed Leonora, 
which reads : — 

" Mr. Spectator, — Your paper is a part of my tea-equipage ; and 
my servant knows my humor so well that, calling for my breakfast 
this morning (it being past my usual hour), she answered, the Specta- 
tor was not yet come in, but the tea-kettle boiled, and she expected it 
every moment." 

The Spectator was published from March, 1711, to De- 
cember, 1712, through six hundred and thirty-five num- 
bers. Its form was popular, and had many successors, 
among them The Guardian, The Freeholder, Johnson's 
Rambler and Idler, and Goldsmith's Bee and Citizen of the 
World. 

Cato. — An event of little importance to us, but of great 
importance to Addison, was the production of his tragedy 



ADDISON. 117 

of Cato, in 1713. The play was a wonderful success. Night 
after night an applauding audience crowded the theatre, 
Whig and Tory finding delight in applying the political 
sentiments of the piece to the English politics of their own 
day ; but after a few weeks the enthusiasm cooled, and the 
play was no longer heard of upon the stage. Readers find its 
story uninteresting, and its characters lifeless. Cato, like 
the tragedies of the French, was written with strict regard 
for the classical unities. Voltaire said, " Addison was the 
first Englishman who wrote a reasonable tragedy." The 
play has stirring lines and admirable pieces of declama- 
tion. Cato's soliloquy upon immortality is a well known 
and admired passage. 

Addison's Social and Political Career. — Addison was not 
merely a man of letters. There were many men of his 
time, — Swift, Steele, Congreve, Gay, Prior, — who led both 
a political and a literary life. Addison himself held sev- 
eral lucrative and honorable offices, and was a member of 
the House of Commons. He was a faithful but not a 
distinguished public official. His unconquerable timidity 
prevented him from speaking with effect. The presence 
of more than two or three friends made him shrink into 
himself, though we have the word of Lady Mary Wortley 
Montagu that "Addison was the best company in the 
world." He was a man of many friends and but one 
enemy,— Pope, whose famous portrait of Atticus was un- 
questionably meant for Addison. Pope sneered at him 
because he loved the little court of admirers that sur- 
rounded him at the coffee-house : — 

"Were there One whose fires 
True Genius kindles, and fair Fame inspires; 
Blest with each talent and each art to please, 
And born to write, converse, and live with ease: 
Should such a man, too fond to rule alone, 
Bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne, 



118 ADDISON. 

View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes, 
And hate for arts that caus'd himself to rise ; 
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, 
And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer; 
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike, 
Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike; 
Alike reserv'd to blame, or to commend, 
A tim'rous foe, and a suspicious friend ; 
Dreading ev'n fools, by flatterers besieg'd, 
And so obliging, that he 1 ne'er oblig'd; 
Like Cato, give his little senate laws, 
And sit attentive to his own applause; 
While Wits and Templars ev'ry sentence raise, 
And wonder with a foolish face of praise ; 
Who but must laugh, if such a man there be? 
Who would not weep, if Atticus were he?" 

In 1716, Addison's worldly fortunes were further ad- 
vanced by his marriage with the Countess Dowager of 
Warwick. The year after his marraige, he reached the 
highest point of his political career ; he was made Secre- 
tary of State, and in this eminent position, exhibited the 
liberality, modesty, and genuine public spirit that had 
characterized his whole life. 

Addison died at the early age of forty-seven. 

Addison's Poetry was very popular when it was written, 
but the judgment of later times has given it a place far 
below his prose. It is cold, correct, and monotonous, — 
the poetry of a calm, sensible man, who understood and 
applied the rules of his art. (1.) The Campaign is a stiff 
and prosy poem. Addison deserves credit, however, for his 
conception of his hero, Marlborough. He abandons the 
absurd custom of former poets, who paint a military hero 
as slaughtering whole squadrons with his single arm. He 
places the glory of a great general on its true basis — the 
power of conceiving and carrying out profound designs, 
the possession of calmness and foresight in the hour of 



ADDISOtf. 119 

danger. The praises of Marlborough were none too lofty 
for the popular demand. The town went wild over one 
passage, in which the hero was compared to an angel guid- 
ing a whirlwind : — 

" So when an angel by divine command, 
With rising tempests shakes a guilty land 
(Such as of late o'er pale Britannia passed), 
Calm and serene he flrives the furious blast ; 
And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform, 
Rides on the whirlwind and directs the storm." 

(2.) Addison's best poetry is contained in his hymns. 
Religious feeling seems to have been the most fervent that 
he knew ; more inspiration found its way into his hymns 
than into Cato or The Campaign. Many of them are 
familiar. Addison wrote the solemn hymn beginning 
with these lines : — 

" When all thy mercies, my God! 
My rising soul surveys, 
Transported with the view, I'm lost 
In wonder, love, and praise." 

Addison's Prose. — As Pope's poetry shows the best results 
of the literary influences of his day, so Addison's shows the 
worst. In poetry he was stilted and artificial ; while in 
prose he was entirely natural and at ease. By readers of 
the nineteenth century, Addison is valued solely as a writer 
of short essays for The Tatler, Spectator, and Guardian. 
(1.) For The Tatler he furnished one-sixth, for The Spec- 
tator more than one-half, and for The Guardian one- 
third of the matter. His papers are signed by one of the 
four letters, C. L. I. 0., either the letters of the name 
of Clio, or the initials of Chelsea, London, Islington, and 
the Office, the places where the essays were written. 
(2.) The variety of his subjects is remarkable. No theme 



120 ADDISOtf. 

is too lofty, none too trivial, to furnish matter for amusing 
or profitable reflection. From patches, fans, and head- 
dresses to the most serious questions of morality and relig- 
ion, every subject is lightly but wisely treated. Among 
these papers are critical essays, like the series upon Para- 
dise Lost. Milton had been neglected by the eighteenth 
century, and Addison's appreciative criticism did much to 
establish the modern regard f o* his poetry. Another series 
of papers introduces the inimitable Sir Roger de Ooverley 
and his circle of dependents. 

(3.) The special mission of The Spectator was accom- 
plished in its short lay-sermons on the follies and vices of 
the times. " Addison made morality fashionable," says 
Taine. He reconciled virtue and good-breeding. He 
taught that piety is not priggishness ; that elegance of man- 
ner does not, of necessity, harden the heart. Addison is 
a teacher of manners as well as of morals. " Kindness," 
he says, "is so necessary to our comfort in this world, that 
man has been forced to invent a kind of artificial human- 
ity, which is what we express by the word good-breeding." 

(4.) Pope was the typical wit of Queen Anne's age, and 
Addison the humorist. There is no flash in Addison's fun, 
and there is no sting. He possessed a sense of the ridicu- 
lous that would have made him a terror to society, had it 
been guided by a less tender heart. Nothing in his charac- 
ter is more admirable than the restraint that he placed 
upon his humor. " The gentle satirist," Thackeray calls 
him, — "the gentle satirist, who hit no unfair blow; the 
kind judge, who castigated only in smiling." 

(5.) In Addison's writing certain qualities of style reach 
their perfection : simplicity, ease, naturalness, and ele- 
gance. His English is colloquial and idiomatic, without 
loss of grace and dignity. A recent writer, Robert Louis 
Stevenson, speaks of "an elegant homeliness that rings of 
the true Queen Anne," "a strain of graceful gossip, sing- 



A D D I S H . 121 

ing like the fireside kettle." Such was the charm of Addi- 
son. His writing is always calm, serene, and leisurely, 
never hurried, energetic, or impassioned. It represents the 
perfection of good-breeding in writing. Said Dr. Johnson, 
' ' Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but 
not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his 
days and nights to the volumes of Addison." (P. 290.) 

Thackeray wrote delightfully of Addison. In TJie En- 
glish Humorists he says : — 

"Addison wrote his papers as gayly as if he were going out for a 
holiday. When Steele's Tatter first began its prattle, Addison, then 
in Ireland, caught at his friend's notion, poured in paper after paper, 
and contributed the stores of his mind, the sweet fruits of his read- 
ing, the delightful gleanings of his daily observation, with a wonder- 
ful profusion He was six-and-thirty years old ; full and ripe. 

He had not wdrked crop after crop from his brain, cutting and sow- 
ing and cutting again, like other luckless cultivators of letters. He 
had not done much as yet ; a few Latin poems — graceful prolusions ; 
a polite book of travels ; a dissertation on medals, not very deep ; 
four acts of a tragedy, a great classical exercise ; and The Campaign, 
a large prize poem that won an enormous prize. But with his friend's 
discovery of The Tatter, Addison's calling was found, and the most 
delightful talker in the world began to speak 

' ' When this man looks from the world whose weaknesses he de- 
scribes so benevolently, up to the Heaven which shines over us all, I 
can hardly fancy a human face lighted up with a more serene rapture; 
a human intellect thrilling with a purer love and adoration than 
Joseph Addison's. Listen to him: from your childhood you have 
known the verses ; but who can hear their sacred music without love 
and awe ?-=- 

" ' Soon as the evening shades prevail, 
The moon takes up the wondrous tale, 
And nightly to the listening earth 
Eepeats the story of her hirth ; 
And all the stars that round her hum, 
And all the planets in their turn, 
Confirm the tidings as they roll, 
And spread the truth from pole to pole. 
What though in solemn silence all 
Move round this dark terrestrial hall ; 
What though no real voice nor sound, 
Among their radiant orhs be found ; 



122 ADDISON. 

In reason's ear they all rejoice, 
And utter forth a glorious voice 
Forever singing as they shine, 
The hand that made us is divine.' 

"It seems to me those verses shine like the stars. They shine out 
of a great, deep calm. When he turns to Heaven, a Sabbath comes 
over that man's mind ; and his face lights up frOm it with a glory of 
thanks and prayer. His sense of religion stirs through his -whole 
being." 

Suggestions for Reading.— The Spectator, Nos. 1, 2, 10, 13, 26, 
37, 102, 106, 112, 122, 130, 159, 275, 281, 329, 335, 517 -—Eighteenth 
Century Essays, edited by Austin Dobson ; — Macaulay's Essay on 
Addison ; — Thackeray's English Humorists, Lecture on Addison. 



In this chapter we have considered: — 

1. The Prose of the Augustan Age. 

2. Early Life of Addison* 

3. The Tatler. 

4. TJie Spectator. 

5. Cato. 

6. Addison's Social and Political Career. 

7. His Poetry. 

8. His Prose. 



CHAPTEH XL 

JONATHAN SWIFT. 

(1667-1145.) 

" No English is more robust than Swift's, no wit more scathing, no 
life in private and public more sad and proud, no death more pitia- 
ble." — Stopford Brooke. 

"He moves laughter, but never joins in it. He appears in his 
works such as he appears in society. All the company are convulsed 
with merriment, while the Dean, the author of all the mirth, preserves 
an invincible gravity, and even sourness of aspect, and gives utterance 
to the most eccentric and ludicrous fancies, with the air of a man 
reading the commination service." — T. B. Macaulay. 

"Swift was in person tall, strong and well made, of a dark com- 
plexion, but with blue eyes, black and bushy eyebrows, nose some- 
what aquiline, and features which well expressed the stern, haughty, 
and dauntless turn of his mind. He was never known to laugh, and 
his smiles are happily characterized by the well-known lines of Shake- 
speare, — indeed, the whole description of Cassius might be applied to 
Swift:— 

1 He reads much : 
He is a great observer, and he looks 
Quite through the deeds of men : . . . . 
Seldom he smiles, and smiles in such a sort 
As if he mocked himself, and scorned his spirit 
That could be mov'd to smile at anything.' " 

—Walter Scott 

" Perhaps I may allow the dean 
Had too much satire in his vein, 
And seemed determined not to starve it, 
Because no age could more deserve it. 
Yet malice never was his aim ; 
He lashed the vice, but spared the name ; 
No individual could resent, 
Where thousands equally were meant. 



124 SWIFT. 

True genuine dullness moved his pity, 
Unless it offered to be witty. 
Those who their ignorance confess'd, 
He ne'er offended with a jest ; 
But laugh'd to hear an idiot quote 
A verse from Horace learn'd by rote. 
****** 
He gave the little wealth he had 
To build a house for fools and mad ; 
And show'd by one satiric touch 
No nation wanted it so much." 

— Swift's Verses On the Death of Dr. Swift 

Life. — Of the three men who make the Age of Queen 
Anne illustrious, Jonathan Swift was the most original 
and powerful. This remarkable man was born in Dublin ; 
but his parents were English. He lived to be an old man, 
for he was born in 1667, and died in 1745. His mother 
was early left a widow in extreme poverty, and Swift in 
his childhood was dependent on the charity of relatives. 
Till he was twenty-one, his life was passed entirely in Ire- 
land. His uncle sent him to school at Kilkenny, and 
afterwards to Trinity College, Dublin. Swift was, there- 
fore, offered the best education that Ireland afforded. He 
did not accept it very graciously, or do his family much 
credit. Logic and metaphysics were the pride of the uni- 
versity ; but Swift detested them both. He was granted 
his degree " by special favor, " as is recorded on the college 
books to this day. His next step in life enabled him to 
carry on his education in the lawless fashion that he liked. 
In 1688 he entered the household of Sir William Temple, 
a distant relative, in whose service he remained as secre- 
tary for six years. His social position, midway between 
that of a member of the family and that of a servant, was 
galling to his prond spirit. Sir William Temple probably 
did not treat the raw Irish lad with much distinction ; but 
we must remember that Swift had as yet done nothing to 



SWIFT. 125 

convince the world of his abilities. For such a young 
man, with education and without money, the natural, al- 
most necessary, career at that time lay within the Church. 
On the death of Temple, in 1699, Swift left Moor Park, 
and took charge of a little country parish not far from 
Dublin, where he preached to a congregation of fifteen 
persons. At a week-day service, when only he and his 
parish clerk were present, Swift is said to have begun the 
service, " Dearly beloved Eoger, the Scripture moveth you 
and me." 

Swift paid frequent visits to London, where he was fast 
making friends with the men best worth knowing. He 
was beginning to be recognized as an author, for he had 
published TJie -Tale of a Tub, a satire written several years 
before at Moor Park. In the family of Sir William Tem- 
ple, moreover, he had acquired a taste for politics. He 
began life as a Whig, and . wrote the first of his powerful 
pamphlets in support of that party. But there were many 
reasons why he had not at heart much sympathy with the 
Whigs, and it is not strange that, in 1710, he went over to 
the Tories. He became, then, the fiercest antagonist of 
the Whigs, writing against them pamphlet after pamphlet, 
the most bitterly partisan, the most savage and powerful in 
our literature. His Public Spirit of the Whigs, his Con- 
duct of the Allies, and his Reflections on the Barrier 
Treaty are among the most famous. The Tories had re- 
ceived Swift with open arms, and had done their best to 
obtain for him the English bishopric that was the great 
object of his ambition. But some one had whispered to 
Queen Anne that no man who had Avritten The Tale of a 
Ttib was fit to be a bishop. Swift was obliged to content 
himself with the Deanery of St. Patrick's, Dublin. This 
was the clerical office that he held from 1713 till his death, 
in 1745. 

The Tories went out of power, and the Whigs came in 



126 SWIFT. 

again upon the death of Queen Anne. Swift retired into 
exile,, for he had seen the end of his ambitions. The rest 
of his life he spent in Ireland, with but two more visits to 
England. For the next ten or twelve years he performed 
faithfully his duties as dean of the cathedral. There is 
little more to record of him. The Whigs were secure, and 
feared little from their ancient enemy. They were made, 
however, to feel once more his power. 

The condition of Ireland was just then deplorable ; the 
manufacturing industries and the commerce of the coun- 
try were paralyzed ; the agricultural classes were reduced 
to the lowest depth of degradation. Swift boldly pro- 
claimed that Ireland's misery was due to "subjection to a 
government not intentionally cruel, but absolutely selfish, 
which acted on the principle that the happiness of Ireland 
should not weigh against the convenience of England." The 
special act of selfishness that roused Swift in 1724 was 
briefly this : Copper half-pence to a large amount were 
to be coined by an Englishman in Ireland, and forced into 
circulation. Copper to the value of £60,000 was to be 
made into half-pence amounting to £100,000, clearly leav- 
ing to some one a large profit. In the famous Drapier 
Letters, published in a Dublin newspaper, Swift endeav- 
ored to persuade the people to refuse these dishonest half- 
pence, and to refrain, moreover, from using any English 
manufactures. These letters were signed M. B., Drapier, 
and were ostensibly written by a plain, hard-working Irish 
tradesman. For some time no one suspected the author. 
Excitement was so great, that £300 was offered for his dis- 
covery. When the letters had done their work, and the 
obnoxious coinage had been stopped, the secret of M. B., 
Drapier, became known. Swift's defense of the rights of 
the Irish people made him from that moment the idol of 
that warm-hearted race. His influence was unbounded. 
The Lord Lieutenant wrote home, " When people ask me 



SWIFT. 127 

how I govern Ireland, I reply, ' So as to please Dr. 
Swift/" 

Gulliver's Travels was published two years later, and was 
received with delight and admiration. Swift was too sad 
a man by that time to care much about the fortunes of his 
book. The life of his beloved Stella was drawing to a 
close ; many of his old friends were already dead ; while 
he himself was tortured with forebodings of insanity. 
Said Dr. Young : — 

" I remember, as I and others were taking with Swift an evening 
walk, about a mile out of Dublin, he stopped short ; we passed on ; 
but, perceiving he did not follow us, I went back, and found him 
fixed as a statue, and earnestly gazing upwards at a noble tree, which, 
in its upper branches, was much withered and decayed. Pointing at 
it, he said, ' I shall be like that tree ; I shall die at the top.' " 

His fears were cruelly realized. In 1741 he passed into 
a state of idiocy that lasted, without interruption, till his 
death, in 1745. He is buried in his own Cathedral of St. 
Patrick ; and over his grave is inscribed that terrible epi- 
taph composed by himself, in which he speaks of resting 
"where fierce indignation can no longer torture his 
heart," " ubi sceva indignatio ulterius cor lacerare nequit." 
But the most impressive monument of this sad life is 
the hospital for idiots and incurable madmen, built 
and endowed in accordance with the directions of Swift's 
will. 

Stella and Vanessa. — An account of Swift's career would 
be incomplete without some mention of the two women 
whose lives were so closely connected with his. A bright, 
pretty little girl, named Esther Johnson, had grown up 
in Sir William Temple's household, to whom the moody 
young scholar Swift had become " guide, philosopher, and 
friend." He superintended her education. When the 



128 SWIFT. 

Temple household was broken up, and Swift returned to 
his native country, Stella, having few friends, went also 
to live in Ireland, where she could invest her little fortune 
to better advantage, and where she could see occasionally 
the best friend that now remained to her. She was ac- 
companied by an elderly lady, and Swift never saw her 
except in the presence of a third person. Whether he 
wished to marry Stella, or did marry her, will never be 
known with certainty. It was believed by many that they 
were privately married in the garden of the deanery 
in 1716. The Journal to Stella is a remarkable relic of 
their friendship. This was a sort of prolonged letter writ- 
ten to her during his absence in London, — the most famil- 
iar, undignified, fond, and foolish letter that ever saw the 
light. 

When Swift was in London, at the height of his power, 
he had made the acquaintance of Hester Vanhomrigh, a 
bright young creature, in whose mind he appears again to 
have taken a school-masterly interest. Vanessa, as he 
called her, fell in love with him, and, on the death of her 
father, removed to Ireland. There Swift continued his 
visits without explaining to either of the ladies the nature 
of his relations to the other. Vanessa, however, learned 
of the existence of Stella, wrote her a melodramatic letter, 
and received an astonished answer. When Swift next 
visited her, Vanessa presented him with Stella's letter. 
He threw it to the ground, trampled on it, and strode out 
of the house, never to enter it again. Vanessa's heart was 
broken ; she died not long after. Whatever Swift's rela- 
tion to Stella, we at least know that, from the time they 
were pupil and teacher at Moor Park, she was, of all the 
world, the human being whom he loved best. 

Character. — The worst side of Swift's character is prob- 
ably known to the world. It was a part of the morbidness 



SWIFT. 129 

of his disposition that he liked to trick people into believ- 
ing ill of him, and then hated them because he succeeded. 
His thoughts and words were most unkind ; his deeds were 
often most generous. He hated humanity in general, but 
many an individual could have told of his good deeds. His 
was "a hand never weary of giving gifts to the poor, and 
blows to the powerful." " Who would have wished this 
man for a friend ? " asks Thackeray. Yet so good an 
authority as Addison declares that Swift was "the most 
agreeable companion, the truest friend, and the greatest 
genius of his age." Swift was a born ruler : no one, man 
or woman, that came near him, but felt the irresistible 
force of his personal influence. 

Swift's Early Writings.— (1.) The Tale of a Tub is a 
title that Swift explains in his preface : " It is a tub 
thrown to the wits to stay their on-coming rush upon the 
weak sides of Eeligion and Government, even as sailors 
throw the barrel to the whale to save the ship." The Tale 
of a Tub is a satirical history of the Church. It is equal 
to Gulliver's Travels in depth of meaning, fierce satire, 
and formidable wit ; and it is superior to Gulliver in vigor 
and rapidity. "What a genius I had when I wrote that 
book!" Swift said in his old age. The Tale of a Tub re- 
lates the adventures of three brothers, Peter, Jack, and 
Martin. Peter (the Eoman Catholic Church), Martin (the 
Lutherans), and Jack (the Calvinists) received coats from 
their dying father. The coats were to last them as long as 
they lived, provided they kept them clean. But as fash- 
ions changed, the coats changed with them. Embroidery, 
fringes, and tinsel conceal the simple garments bequeathed 
by the father. Peter hides the will, and assumes lordly 
dignities. Martin and Jack steal copies of the will, and 
leave Peter's house. Martin tries to remove some of the 
trappings from his coat, and to leave some ; but Jack, 



130 SWIFT. 

in his earnestness, rips off all the embroidery, and tears 
away much of the coat. 

Eoman Catholics or Presbyterians might well be scan- 
dalized, but Swift's own sect had not so much reason to 
complain. His effort was to get the laugh on the side of 
Martin, or the Eef ormed Church, for Swift was a thorough- 
going and consistent Church of England man. 

(2. ) The Battle of the Boohs is not a work of importance. 
A foolish discussion had been going on as to the respective 
merits of Ancient and Modern Literature. Sir William 
Temple had been engaged in the contest, and his young 
secretary joined his side. 

Swift's Poetry, as poetry, deserves no serious considera- 
tion. If ever man viewed life in its most prosaic aspect, 
that man was Swift. It is a poet's office to create illusions, 
but it was Swift's special gift to destroy them. He wrote 
rhymes and verses, it is true, like every other man of let- 
ters who lived then. The Dean had, indeed, a more than 
common knack at jingling. Cadenus and Vanessa, and 
Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift, are characteristic. 

Gulliver's Travels. — The greatest of Swift's works is the 
Voyayes of Gulliver, a vast satire upon humanity. The 
plan of the book is as follows : A plain, honest ship-sur- 
geon describes, in a simple, straightforward fashion, the 
strange scenes and extraordinary adventures through which 
he passes. The contrast between the absurdity of the inci- 
dents and the gravity with which they are related, illus- 
trates the peculiar humor of Swift. Solemn truthfulness 
was his favorite trick of style, as it was Defoe's. So com- 
pletely did Gulliver's Travels impose upon some readers, 
that a certain Irish bishop declared "the book was full of 
improbable lies, and, for his part, he hardly believed a 
word of it." 



SWIFT. 181 

The work consists of four parts, or voyages. In the first, 
Gulliver visits the country of Lilliput, whose inhabitants 
are about six inches in stature, and where all the houses, 
trees, ships, and dumb animals are in exact proportion to 
the miniature human beings. The invention displayed in 
the droll and surprising incidents is unbounded ; while the 
strange scenes and adventures are recorded with an ap- 
pearance of sober honesty that is inimitable. The second 
voyage is to Brobdingnag, a country of enormous giants, 
sixty feet in height ; and here Gulliver plays the same part 
that the pigmy Lilliputians had played to him. As in the 
first voyage, the contemptible and ludicrous side of human 
things is presented by showing how trifling they would ap- 
pear in almost microscopic proportions, so in Brobdingnag 
we are made to perceive how petty and ridiculous our poli- 
tics, our wars, and our ambitions would appear to the per- 
ceptions of a gigantic race. The third part carries Gulli- 
ver to a series of strange and fantastic countries. The first 
is Laputa, a flying island, inhabited by philosophers and 
astronomers ; whence he passes to the Academy of Lagaclo; 
and thence to Glubbdubdrib and Luggnagg. In this part 
the author introduces the terrific description of the Struld- 
brugs, wretches who are cursed with bodily immortality 
without intellects or affections. Gulliver's last voyage is 
to the country of the Houyhnhnms, a region where horses 
are the reasoning beings ; and men, under the name of 
Yahoos, are degraded to the rank of noxious, filthy, and 
unreasoning brutes. 

Swift said that he wrote the book "to vex the world 
rather than to divert it " ; but Lilliput and Brobdingnag 
are certainly more diverting than vexatious. The satire 
beyond this point, however, loses its playfulness, and grows 
more and more bitter at every step, till, in the Yahoos, it 
reaches a pitch of insane ferocity. ' ' Great wits to madness 
nearly are allied," and when we read the last book of Gul- 



132 SWIFT. 

liver, we are not astonished that its author dicl, indeed, go 
mad. (P. 296.) 

Swift's Style. — A great rhetorician has called Swift the 
master of the " plain style." Nothing could be a greater 
contrast to the urbane manner of Addison, which was, in 
the old phrase, a "polite style." Swift took no pains to 
please ; he was brutally vigorous. He uses the plainest 
Anglo-Saxon, seldom employs a metaphor, almost never 
makes use of a quotation. He is, in fact, one of the most 
original of English writers. He says of himself that Dr. 
Swift 

" To steal a hint was never known, 
But what he writ was all his own." 

Suggestions for Readings. — Gulliver's Travels, Parts I. and II.; — 
Johnson's Lives of the Poets, — Life of Swift ; — Thackeray's English 
Humorists, — Lecture on Swift. 



In this chapter we have considered: — 

1. Life of Swift. 

2. Stella and Vanessa. 

3. Character of Swift. 
d. His Early Writings. 

5. His Poetry. 

6. Gulliver's Travels. 

7. Swift's Style. 



CH&FTEB XIL 

DANIEL DEFOE. 

(1661-1731.) 

"To have pleased all the boys in Europe for near a hundred and 
fifty years is a remarkable feat." — Leslie Stephen. 

1 ' Was there ever anything written by mere man, that the reader 
wished longer, except Robinson Crusoe, Don Quixote, and Pilgrim's 
Progress? " — Dr. Johnson. 

"Robinson Crusoe is delightful to all ranks and classes. It is 
capital kitchen reading, and equally worthy, from its deep interest, 
to find a place in the libraries of the wealthiest and the most learned." 
— Charles Lamb. 

Prose Fiction in the Eighteenth Century. — English prose 
acquired excellence and importance in the eighteenth cent- 
ury, and with this development of prose, there grew up 
several new departments of writing. Of these the period- 
ical and the novel have been most conspicuous in the last 
hundred years. The rise of the periodical has been traced ; 
the growth of the novel must be briefly considered. Up 
to this point, English literature had had no prose fiction 
in the modern sense of the term. It is idle to call Sidney's 
Arcadia a novel, or in a history of English literature to con- 
sider the Latin philosophical romances of Bacon and More. 
In the age of Elizabeth, the taste for fiction was gratified 
by the drama. A few novels were written, but they were 
soon made over into plays. Lodge's Rosalynde, for exam- 
ple, became Shakespeare's As You Like It, and Greene's 
Pandosto was the foundation of The Whiter 's Tale. 

The use of prose narrative in the delineation of passions, 



134 DEFOE. 

characters, and incidents of real life was first developed by 
writers in the eighteenth. century, among whom the names 
of Defoe, Richardson, Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne are 
the most brilliant. 

(1.) Samuel Richardson was a successful London printer, 
who, up to the age of fifty, had no thought of becoming an 
author. He had been famous from his youth as a fluent 
and elegant letter- writer ; and a London firm, wishing to 
publish a "complete letter-writer/' applied to Eichardson 
as the person best fitted to prepare the work. After he 
had accepted the commission, it occurred to him that he 
might make the letters tell a connected story. The result 
was his first novel, Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded. Eich- 
ardson suddenly found himself famous. Fashionable ladies 
formed an admiring circle about him ; grave moralists like 
Dr. Johnson praised his truth to nature, and popular 
preachers applauded the high tone of his morality. Cla- 
rissa Harloive, published in 1748, and Sir Charles Grand- 
ison, in 1753, increased the fame of Richardson. Of his 
three novels, Pamela dealt with low life, Sir Charles 
Grandison with high life, while Clarissa Harlowe por- 
trayed the middle class of society. This last novel de- 
scribed the people and the life that Eichardson himself 
knew best, and it was his greatest success. Richardson's 
novels are, to our taste, high-flown and tedious, and few 
modern readers have patience to follow Clarissa Harlowe 
or Pamela through eight volumes of adventures. Richard- 
son had, however, a minute knowledge of the human heart 
and great skill in displaying its workings. His books are 
pre-eminently novels of sentiment. It has always been 
easy to laugh at him, and no one in his own time found 
him so supremely ridiculous as did the witty and rollick- 
ing Harry Fielding. 

(2.) Fielding's first novel, Joseph Andrews, was intended 
as a caricature of Pamela. This book contains the famous 



DEFOE. 135 

character of Parson Adams, who is as learned and simple, 
as wise and foolish, as Don Quixote himself. Amelia and 
Tom Jones are the best of Fielding's novels. They are the 
first complete pictures of English life in fiction. What 
they relate is a part of the real history of the English peo- 
ple : how they ate and drank and slept ; how they lived in 
country or in city ; how they walked and rode and trav- 
eled, talked and laughed and amused themselves. In the 
construction of his plots, Fielding was masterly. The 
story of Tom Jones is called by critics one of the few per- 
fect plots in literature. Fielding was a profound student 
of human nature, and his pages are filled with wise and 
humorous delineations of character. His digressions and 
chats with the reader are perhaps inartistic, but they are 
one of the delightful characteristics of Fielding, as they 
are of his great successor, Thackeray. Fielding was a hu- 
morist of the first order. Unfortunately, he had a coarse 
nature, and little delicacy of moral sense. " Humor must 
diffuse itself through, the whole," was one of his maxims in 
novel-writing, but his humor is often so low and vulgar, 
and his morality so contemptible as to stir the resentment 
of a high-minded reader. 

(3.) Smollett was a writer in whom are found the same 
faults of coarseness and low moral tone, but in whom the 
finest qualities of Fielding are absent. He was, however, 
a racy and vigorous writer, who filled his books with noisy 
fun and lively scenes and adventures. His best-known 
novels are Roderick Random and Humphrey Clinker. 
The characters for which his novels are most valued are 
his English sailors. 

(4,) .Laurence Sterne was a whimsical humorist, who 
wrote two famous books — Tristram Shandy and A Senti- 
mental Journey, Tristram Shandy is rather a study of 
character than a connected story. The book is as fantas- 
tic, crotchety, and humorous as Sterne himself. Uncle 



136 DEFOE. 

Toby is his masterpiece as a creation of character. Fine 
humor and delicate pathos are to be found in Sterne's writ- 
ings ; but too often his humor degenerates into buffoonery, 
and his pathos into sentimentality. 

(5.) The greatest of this group of novelists was Field- 
ing, but the writer who yields most pleasure and instruc- 
tion to the young student is Daniel Defoe. 

Defoe's Pamphlets. — In order of time, Defoe comes be- 
fore the writers that have been mentioned, for he was 
born in 1661, and his most famous work, Robinson Crusoe, 
appeared in 1719. Defoe may, therefore, be called the 
founder of modern fiction. He was the son of a London 
butcher named Foe ; but, not liking the family name, he 
thought to give it a more aristocratic form by prefixing the 
syllable De. Defoe was an able and public-spirited citizen, 
active and fearless in every good cause. He was a man of 
whom we say that he was "ahead of his age." As early 
as 1698, he was advocating the founding of insurance com- 
panies, savings banks for the poor, and colleges for the 
higher education of women. He was so filled with the 
desire for various reforms, that he was impelled to write in 
order to bring his views before the public. People then 
read pamphlets, and were influenced by them, as they are 
now by the editorials of their newspapers. Defoe had the 
gift of the journalist, and in our own day might have 
found his way to novel-writing as Dickens did — through 
being an admirable reporter and a ready newspaper writer. 
In religious matters, he was also in advance of his time, 
and urged a freedom of thought and conscience then un- 
known. His radical Protestantism frequently brought him 
into trouble. In spite of fines and imprisonment, he 
boldly published pamphlet after pamphlet, second only to 
Swift's in their vigor and irony. One of these pamphlets 
— The Shortest Way with the Dissenters — had a singular 



DEFOE. 137 

history. Defoe wished to show the English Churchmen 
the absurdity of their intolerance, and so, pretending to 
be on their side, he wrote a paper gravely proposing to rid 
the land of Dissenters by hanging their ministers and ban- 
ishing the people. His irony succeeded better than he had 
intended. People were completely imposed upon by the 
apparent seriousness of his argument, and Defoe was sen- 
tenced to stand in the pillory, because he had dared to 
propose such a monstrous piece of injustice. He loved 
nothing so well as a practical joke, but he must have felt 
in this instance that the joke was turned upon himself. 
He wrote an Ode to the Pillory, describing it as 

" A hieroglyphic state-machine, 
Condemned to punish fancy in." 

Defoe made himself felt in his own time as a vigorous 
defender of religious and political freedom ; but he won 
his place in literature as the writer of Robinson Crusoe. 

Robinson Crusoe. — The first part of Robinson Crusoe 
appeared in 1719, and its success tv as instantaneous. From 
that day to this it has been the most fascinating boys' book 
in the world's literature. Like Pilgrim 1 's Progress, and 
like Gulliver 's Travels, it has not only been read by chil- 
dren, and by the humble and ignorant, but has also de- 
lighted the thoughtful critic. A man alone on a desert 
island supplies a subject that rouses the sympathy and 
breathless attention of every man, woman, and child. To 
this unique and thrilling situation Defoe brought a very 
peculiar power of imagination. "Let us think/' says 
Morley, " how a man of weak imagination would have 
solved the problem : given one man and an island to make 
a story. In Defoe's story, all is life and action." He had 
not imagination in the high sense in which the great poets 
possessed the gift ; it was rather in Defoe a marvelous 



138 DEFOE. 

power of invention, by which he could spin out of his 
mind an intricate web of details. He could close his eyes 
on his own world, and Eobinson Crusoe "making pots and 
pans, catching goats, and sowing corn/' would be as clear 
to his sight as were the visions of The Faerie Queene or 
Paradise Lost that unrolled before Spenser or Milton. In 
this lower order of imaginative writing, Defoe has never 
been surpassed. He not only conceived the situation with 
the utmost distinctness and precision, but he was able also 
to set it before the reader as undoubted fact. " In other 
words/' says Leslie Stephen, "he had the most marvelous 
power ever known of giving verisimilitude to his fictions ; 
or, in other words again, he had the most amazing talent 
on record for telling lies." Defoe was at the mature age 
of fifty-eight when he wrote this famous book, but he went 
about it with the freshness and zest of his first youth. The 
unfailing vivacity of Robinson Crusoe has made it the de- 
light of boys. The humblest people have found it easy 
reading, for Defoe, like Swift, wrote in the "plain style." 
Robinson Crusoe is a famous example of homely, substantial 
Saxon English. (P. 303.) 

Defoe's Other Works of Fiction. — The Memoirs of a 
Cavalier deserves special mention. The work professes to 
have been written by one who had taken part in the great 
Civil War ; and so successfully was the pretense carried 
out, that it deceived even the great Chatham into citing the 
volume as an authentic narrative. In A Journal of the 
Great Plague in London, he shows the same marvelous 
faculty for representing fiction as truth. The imaginary 
annalist, a respectable London shopkeeper, describes the 
terrible sights and incidents of that time with a vividness 
that is appalling. The Adventures of Colonel Jack, Moll 
Flanders, Roxana, and Captain Singleton, show the same 
power of feigning reality. His True Relation of the Ap- 



DEFOE. 139 

parition of one Mrs. Veal was a bold experiment upon the 
credulity of the public. He wrote the story at the request 
of a bookseller, in order to aid the sale of a dull book, 
Drelincourt on Death. Mrs. Veal returns from the dead 
and advises her friend to read this book, if she desires re- 
liable information about the other world. Defoe's purpose 
was accomplished, for the whole edition of Drelincourt on 
Death soon disappeared from the bookseller's shelves. 

Defoe's writings are not studies of character ; they have 
■ not elaborate plot ; they do not deal with the passion of 
love. The fiction of Defoe is the novel in a state of forma- 
tion. Fielding took us a step farther towards Dickens, 
Thackeray, and George Eliot. It was not until the nine- 
teenth century that the novel was to gain its high and 
honorable place in literature. 

Suggestions for Reading.— Robinson Crusoe; — Leslie Stephen's 
Horn's in a Library, — Essay on Defoe. 



In this chapter we have considered: — 

1. Prose Fiction in the Eighteenth Century. 

2. Defoe's Pamphlets. 

3. Robinson Crusoe. 

4. Defoe's Other Works of Fiction. 



chapteb xm; 

SAMUEL JOHNSON. 
(1709-1784.) 

"A mass of genuine manhood." — Thomas Carlyle. 

" Johnson, to be sure, has a rough manner; but no man alive has 
a better heart. He has nothing of the bear but the skin." — Oliver 
Goldsmith. 

"Rabelais and all other wits are nothing compared to him. You 
may be diverted by them; but Johnson gives you a forcible hug, and 
squeezes laughter out of you, whether you will or no." — David Gar- 
rick. 

"If it be asked who first, in England, at this period, breasted the 
waves and stemmed the tide of infidelity, — who, enlisting wit and 
eloquence, together with argument and learning on the side of re- 
vealed religion, first turned the literary current in its favor, and 
mainly prepared the reaction which succeeded, — that praise seems 
most justly to belong to Dr. Samuel Johnson." — Lord Mahon: His- 
tory of England. 

' ' He had a loud voice, and a slow, deliberate utterance, which, no 
doubt, gave some additional weight to the sterling metal of his con- 
versation. Lord Pembroke said once to me at Wilton, with a happy 
pleasantry, and some truth, that ' Dr. Johnson's sayings would not 
appear so extraordinary were it not for his boiv-ivow way.'' But I 
admit the truth of this only on some occasions. . . . His person was 
large, robust, I may say approaching to the gigantic, and grown un- 
wieldly from corpulency. His countenance was naturally of the cast 
of an ancient statue, but somewhat disfigured by the scars of that 
evil which, it was formerly imagined, the royal touch could cure. He 
was now in his sixty-fourth year, and was becoming a little dull oi 
hearing. His sight had always been somewhat weak; yet, so much 
does mind govern and even supply the deficiency of organs, that his 
perceptions were uncommonly quick and accurate. His head, and 
sometimes also his body, shook with a kind of motion like the effect 






SAMUEL JOHKSON. 141 

of a palsy: he appeared to be frequently disturbed by cramps, or 
convulsive contractions, of the nature of that distemper called St. 
Vitus's dance. "He wor£a full suit of plain brown clothes, with twisted 
hair-buttons of the same color, a large, bushy, grayish wig, a plain 
shirt, black worsted stockings, and silver buckles. Upon his tour, 
when journeying, he wore boots, and a very wide brown cloth great- 
coat, with pockets which might have almost held the two volumes of 
his folio Dictionary; and he carried in his hand a large'English oak 
stick. Let me not be censured for mentioning such minute particu- 
lars: everything relative to so great a man is worth observing."— 
Boswell. 

Early Life of Johnson. — The central figure in the liter- 
ary history of the eighteenth century is Samuel Johnson. 
He was the son of a poor bookseller in Lichfield. When 
a child, he "browsed" among books, as Charles Lamb 
did in his boyhood ; and, having a marvelous memory, 
became known in the town as a prodigy. He went to a 
Dame School, and was afterward placed under the charge 
of a certain formidable Mr. Hunter. Johnson became one 
of the famous Latin scholars of his time, and, when asked 
how he acquired such learning, he declared, with ap- 
proval, that it was "whipped into " him. In 1728, as poor 
as Chaucer's Clerk of Oxenford, he entered Pembroke 
College, Oxford. In spite of the hardships that he suf- 
fered there, he loved his college faithfully. His poverty 
forced him to leave the university before taking* his de- 
gree ; but, years after, when he came to be " the great 
lexicographer/' Oxford was proud to confer upon him a 
doctor's degree. Johnson left the university at the age of 
twenty-two. His father had died ; he had no money, no 
influential friends, no plans, no prospects. He had noth- 
ing to begin life with but intellect. His own career illus- 
trated sadly the truth of his own famous verse : — 

" Slow rises worth by poverty depressed." 

His life was a hand-to-hand struggle with poverty till he 



142 SAMUEL JOHNSON. 

was fifty-three. In his first effort to be independent, he 
set up " an academy for young gentlemen" in Lichfield, 
which failed outright. He had, meanwhile, married a 
widow old enough to be his mother. Garrick describes 
Mrs. Johnson as very fat, with painted cheeks, and fan- 
tastic dress and manners. She appears, however, to have 
had the good sense to recognize the worth of the man 
she had married. She introduced her extraordinary young 
husband to her daughter: " My dear, this is the most sensi- 
ble man I ever met." He loved her with romantic devo- 
tion, and when she died clung to her memory with a loyalty 
that was touching. 

The failure of his school drove Johnson to London to 
seek his fortune. He became a bookseller's hack, a liter- 
ary drudge, such as Pope had attacked in his Dunciad. 
He had no sentiment about a literary career. " No man 
but a blockhead," he said, "ever wrote except for money." 
Poor Johnson needed money in those days. " Yours 
without a dinner," — "Yours impransus" — he signs 
himself in a note to his employer. He and his friend 
Savage, it is said, would walk the street all night when 
they could not pay for a lodging. Such experiences do 
not breed fine manners; and a man who "roughs it" as 
Johnson did, is himself rough at last. 

He wrote for various publications, and oftenest for the 
Gentleman's Magazine. None of his work attracted much 
attention until, in 1738, he composed his satire called Lon- 
don. It was published anonymously, but people began at 
once to ask for the author. The great Mr. Pope, happily 
for the new poem, inquired out the writer, and when told 
that it was "some obscure person," said, "He will soon be 
disinterred." London is an imitation of JuvenaFs satire 
upon Rome, and contains much that is true of any great 
city in any age. Johnson came to think more kindly of 
London as he grew older ; there was no music so sweet to 



SAMUEL JOHNSON. 143 

his ear as the rumble and roar of his beloved city. " He 

who is tired of London/' he used to say, " is tired of life." 

Johnson's Dictionary. — From 1747 to 1755 Johnson was 
engaged in the preparation of his famous Dictionary of the 
English Language, This was the most gigantic piece of 
''hack-work" ever undertaken by one man alone. He 
had expected to finish it in three years, but seven had 
passed before it was ready for the printer. In the dic- 
tionary itself he defines a lexicographer as "a harmless 
drudge." Johnson's work may be said, however, to have 
taken a place in literature. To produce a dictionary that 
is actually readable, whose definitions are witty and wise, 
and convey information in a remarkably condensed and 
convenient form, was no small feat. The dictionary was, 
moreover, a collection of choice quotations from English 
literature, brought forward to illustrate the use of words. 
Its chief fault lay in Johnson's ignorance of German and 
other languages kindred to the English. This made him 
a poor authority upon the derivation of words. As no 
such work had before existed, Johnson's Dictionary sup- 
plied a need that had been long felt. Its success was im- 
mense, and " the great lexicographer " was applauded far 
and wide. 

Other Literary Tasks.— (1.) While the dictionary was in 
progress, Johnson had tried his fortune with a play, and 
had persuaded his friend Garrick to bring it out at Drury 
Lane Theatre. The tragedy of Irene ran nine nights, but 
has never since been heard of on the stage. Nor has it 
had much more success with readers. Leslie Stephen says 
that it " can be read only by men in whom a sense of duty 
has been abnormally developed." 

(2.) While at work on his dictionary, Johnson had 
turned aside to write another satire, on his favorite theme, 



144 SAMUEL JOHNSON. 

The Vanity of Human Wishes. (3.) At this time, too, he 
founded, and carried on alone, two periodical papers in the 
form that Addison and Steele had rendered so popular. 
These were the Rambler and the Idler ; the Rambler was 
published from 1750 until 1752, and the Idler from 1758 
until 1760. The ease, grace, pleasantry, and variety that 
gave such charm to the Spectator were quite beyond the 
reach of Johnson. His papers are strong, sober, sensible, 
and heavy. The brilliant French writer Taine continually 
points out that the English love to be preached to, and 
that they worship their moralists. Johnson's Ramblers 
and Idlers gave him a vast moral influence. People did 
not apparently receive them very eagerly ; but they at least 
knew that it was their duty to read them, and valued the 
author accordingly. 

(4.) Johnson's assured literary position did not, how- 
ever, release him from poverty. His aged mother's death, 
in 1759, found him without money to pay the expenses of 
her funeral. To raise a small sum, he spent the nights of 
one week in composing his once famous moral tale, Ras- 
selas, Prince of Abyssinia. The manners and scenery of 
the tale are absurdly different from those of an Oriental 
country, and the story is but a slender thread to hold to- 
gether a series of dialogues and reflections. Rasselas merely 
contains Dr. Johnson's opinions on a great variety of sub- 
jects, and especially his views of human happiness. It is 
still "the vanity of human wishes" that is his theme. 

A New Era in Johnson's Life. — There came a turning- 
point in Dr. Johnson's life, when, in 1762, George III. 
granted Mm a pension of £300. This bounty of the king 
placed him above want, released him from literary drudg- 
ery, and gave him leisure to enjoy society. We now be- 
come acquainted with Johnson the talker. In fact, con- 
versation was the business of the last twenty years of his 



SAMUEL JOHNSON. 145 

life, and he had time for little else. The necessity for work 
being removed, he let his natural indolence have its way, 
talked much and wrote little. 

Boswell's Life of Johnson.— A singular fortune befell 
Dr. Johnson in his acquaintance with a young Scotchman, 
James Boswell, Esq. At the age of fifty-three, just as he 
had entered on his new life of ease and leisure, he fell in 
with this ardent, enthusiastic young admirer. "Who is 
this Scotch cur at Johnson's heels ? " some one asked. 
"He is not a cur," said Goldsmith; "he is only a burr. 
Tom Davies flung him at Johnson in sport, and he has the 
faculty of sticking." From the beginning of their acquaint- 
ance, Boswell made it his habit, immediately on leaving 
Johnson, to write out the conversation that had passed. 
He naively apologizes in the biography for the imperfect 
reports that he gives at first. He says that he was "so 
wrapt in admiration of Johnson's powers," that he could 
not remember what he said ! He tells us that it was not 
till he was "strongly impregnated with the Johnsonian 
ether that he was able to carry in his memory and commit 
to paper the exuberant variety of his wisdom and wit." 
The result of this odd friendship was the best biography of 
English literature. Boswell himself had the good sense 
to predict its success : "I venture to say, that he will be 
seen in this work more completely than any man who has 
ever yet lived." 

Boswell shows us not one man only, but a whole society. 
He has given not merely the most lively and vivid descrip- 
tion of the person, manners, and conversation of Johnson, 
but also the most admirable picture of the society in which 
he was the central figure. Among the meetings most famous 
in that age of clubs were those of the society founded by 
Johnson, together with his friends, Sir Joshua Eeynolds, 
Goldsmith, Burke, Garrick, Bishop Percy, and others. 



146 SAMUEL JOHNSON. 

Boswell shows us Johnson among these companions, in the 
full tide of conversation. Johnson at the Club was John- 
son supreme. "A tavern-chair/' he once said, was "the 
throne of human felicity." He was "a tremendous com- 
panion," his friends declared. 

Boswell himself is not the least entertaining character of 
the biography. He reveals himself with perfect candor, as 
a vain, frivolous, bustling gossip. Yet, however we may 
smile at the follies of his character, we must acknowledge 
Boswell to have been a man of rare gifts. He had the dra- 
matic power that is the highest gift of the writer. His 
report of a conversation is worthy of study. Boswell him- 
self disappears ; his characters speak for themselves. We 
see them and hear them as we see and hear no other group 
of men of the Past. It is done with a few quick strokes 
of the pen such as only a gifted man could command. 
"That loose-flowing, careless-looking work of his, is as a 
picture by one of Nature' s own Artists," says Carlyle. It 
is safe to predict that Boswell's Life of Johnson will be 
read long after Johnson's own writings are covered with 
dust. 

Johnson's Later Years. — Among the many friends of 
Johnson's later life were the Thrales. Mr. Thrale was a 
rich brewer, a member of the House of Commons, and his 
sprightly wife was famous for her talents and for the intel- 
lectual society that she gathered around her. She was still 
more famous for her friendship with Dr. Johnson. There 
were many women that honored and admired him, — women 
like Hannah More and Fanny Burney, while the Doctor 
himself was by no means indifferent to "the endearing 
elegance of female friendship." Under the hospitable roof 
of the Thrales he enjoyed all that friendship, respect, and 
wealth could give. This acquaintance lasted sixteen years, 
and added much to his comfort and happiness. 



SAMUEL JOHNSON, 147 

TJie Lines of the Poets, his last and most important 
work, was published in 1781. A new edition of the En- 
glish poets was to be issued, with an authoritative bio- 
graphical sketch of each writer. Since Dr. Johnson was 
looked upon as the final authority in all literary matters, 
he was engaged to write these sketches. In the nine- 
teenth century a marked change has taken place in liter- 
ary taste, so that many of Johnson's opinions now appear 
narrow and prejudiced. His criticism of Milton, for ex- 
ample, is unsympathetic and unjust. The gentle poet 
Oowper, when he read The Life of Milton, said, "I could 
thrash his old jacket till I made the pension jingle in 
his pocket." Johnson's admiration was given to the poets 
of another class, — Cowley, Waller, Dryden, and Pope. 
Our opinions may often clash with his, yet Tlie Lives 
of the Poets is to this day a work of high value. It 
abounds in vigorous common sense, in shrewd judgments 
of character, and in happy, original turns of expression. 
Johnson's style was here at its best, and his mind at the 
height of its activity. (P. 309 .) 

On the 13th of December, 1784; this great man died, 
and was buried in Westminster Abbey. 

Character of Dr. Johnson. — "As for Johnson," says 
Carlyle, " I have always considered him to be, by nature, 
one of the great English souls." He was an heroic strag- 
gler with misfortune. "Invulnerable patience," — to use 
one of his own stout phrases, — was the key to his charac- 
ter. When has there lived a man so resolute, so independ- 
ent, so invincible ? He had, first of all, to get the better 
of a most unfortunate temperament. He was haunted by 
melancholia that in many men would have destroyed mind 
and character. His piety toward God, and his love for his 
fellow-men, kept him sane. "He was of a most humane 
and benevolent heart," says Boswell. In his poor home he 



148 SAMUEL JOHNSON. 

supported one blind old woman, one broken-down quack 
doctor, and two or three other destitute and forlorn creat- 
ures. All the bear vanished from Johnson in the presence 
of the unfortunate or unhappy. No heart answered with 
more tenderness or compassion to those that needed pity. 
No heart was more unerringly right and noble, whatever 
may have been the errors of his judgment. Johnson's in- 
tellect, indeed, shows a blending of prejudice and liberality, 
of bigotry and candor, that would have baffled a less skill- 
ful biographer than Bos well. Through all the contradic- 
tions of his character, Johnson was sincere. The excess 
of his sincerity made his manners sometimes brutal ; but 
in its right exercise it made him a man of perfect truth 
and courage. Among frivolous men, he was serious; among 
scoffers, he was reverent ; among insincere men, he was sin- 
cere ; among selfish men, he was generous. 

Johnson's Style has received the barbarous name of 
"Johnsonese." It has not the grace and ease of Addi- 
son, or the plainness and vigor of Swift. Johnson said 
himself that he used "too big words and too many of 
them." A style could hardly be charged with worse faults. 
Sonorous Latin derivatives and carefully elaborated sen- 
tences were used to clothe the plainest thoughts. Whether 
describing a scene in a tavern, or enlarging upon the 
grandest of moral themes, he indulges in the same display 
of language. Goldsmith once boldly declared to his face, 
"If you were to write a fable about little fishes, Doctor, 
you would make the little fishes talk like whales." Taine 
thus describes Johnson's style : 

' ' In fact, his phraseology rolls away in solemn periods, in which 
every substantive marches ceremoniously, accompanied by its epithet ; 
pompous words peal like an organ; every proposition is set forth 
balanced by a proposition of equal length ; thought is developed with 
the compassed regularity and official splendor of a procession. . . . 



SAMUEL JOHN-SON. 149 

An oratorical age would recognize him as a master, and attribute to 
him in eloquence the primacy which it attributed to Pope in verse." 

Suggestions for Reading. — Lives of the Poets, edited by Mat- 
thew Arnold ; — The Lives of Addison and Pope ; Preface by Matthew 
Arnold; — Macaulay's Essay on Dr. Johnson; — Johnson {English 
Men of Letters) ; — Selections from Boswell's Life of Johnson ; — Car- 
lyle's Essay on Boswell's Life of Johnson. 



In this chapter we have considered:— 

1. The Early Life of Johnson. 

2. His Dictionary. 

3. Other Literary Tasks. 

4. A New Era in Johnson's Life, 

5. BoswelVs IAfe of Johnson. 

6. Johnson's Later Years. 

7. Character of Johnson. 

8. His Literary Style. 



CHAPTEH XIV. 

EDMUND BURKE. 
(1730-1 "797.) 

"No man of sense could meet Burke by accident under a gateway, 
to avoid a shower, without being convinced that he was the first man 
in England." — Dr. Johnson. 

' ' I admire his eloquence ; I approve his politics ; I adore his chiv- 
alry." — Gibbon. 

1 ' The manner in which Burke brought his higher powers of intel- 
lect to work on statements of fact, and on tables of figures, was 
peculiar to himself. In every part of those huge bales of Indian in- 
formation which repelled almost all other readers, his mind, at once 
philosophical and poetical, found something to instruct or to delight. 
His reason analyzed and digested those vast and shapeless masses; 
his imagination animated and colored them. Out of darkness, and 
dulness, and confusion, he formed a multitude of ingenious theories 
and vivid pictures." — Macaulay. 

Early Life of Burke. — Edmund Burke, the most emi- 
nent political writer of the English literature, was born 
in Dublin, in 1729. Like Swift and Goldsmith, of Irish 
birth, he, like them, felt England to be his home, and Ire- 
land a place of exile. ' ' The absenteeism of her men of 
genius," says Froude, " was a worse wrong to Ireland than 
the absenteeism of her landlords. If Edmund Burke had 
remained in the country where Providence had placed him, 
he might have changed the current of its history." Burke 
was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, where, at the 
same time, Oliver Goldsmith was a student. From Dub- 
lin, Burke went to London, to enter upon his legal studies. 
The law he called "one of the first and noblest of human 



EDMtTKD BITRKE. 151 

sciences ; a science which does more to quicken and invig- 
orate the understanding than all the other kinds of learning- 
put together." In spite of this reverence for his profession, 
Burke did not persevere as a lawyer, but, to his father's dis- 
appointment and indignation, undertook to support him- 
self by literary work. He emerged from obscurity at the 
age of twenty-six, as the author of a production that was 
intended as a huge practical joke. This was The Vindi- 
cation of Natural Society, an ironical imitation of the style 
and sentiments of the brilliant and skeptical Lord Boling- 
broke, the friend of Pope. In pursuing Bolingbroke's 
course of reasoning, he reached the conclusion that, as 
wickedness has prevailed under every form of government, 
society itself is evil, and therefore, that only the savage 
state is conducive to virtue and happiness. The work was 
published anonymously ; but so perfect was it as an imita- 
tion of Bolingbroke, that the most eminent critics of the 
day, among them Samuel Johnson, did not detect its 
intense and delicate irony, and pronounced it a genuine 
posthumous work of the earlier philosopher and states- 
man. 

A few months afterward Burke published An Essay on 
the Sublime and Beautiful. He was by this time a 
regular contributor to the magazines, and was becoming 
known as an authority on politics. In 1765 he was elected 
to Parliament. "Now, we who know Burke," said Dr. 
Johnson, " know that he will be one of the first men in the 
country." 

Burke and America. — During the agitated periods of 
the American and the French Revolution, he was one of 
the ablest and most eloquent debaters in the House of 
Commons. He followed closely the progress of affairs in 
America. None of his writings show him more wise, just, 
and tolerant than the noble speeches on American Taxation 



152 EDMtiifD BUEKE. 

and on Conciliation with America. (P. 321.) In a calm, 
lucid, and practical manner he sets forth the course that En- 
gland should take with the American colonies. The speech 
on Conciliation is an eloquent protest against the war with 
America, that in March, 1775, seemed every day more 
threatening. Burke reminds his hearers that they are 
attacking the liberties of Englishmen when they impose 
an unjust tax on the colonies ; that John Hampden, refus- 
ing to pay ship money, had a cause no more just than that 
of the Boston men who threw the tea overboard. Said 
Burke : — 

"The temper and character which prevail in our colonies, are, I 
am afraid, unalterable by any human art. We cannot, I fear, falsify 
the pedigree of this fierce people, and persuade them that they are 
not sprung from a nation in whose veins the blood of freedom circu- 
lates. The language in which they would hear you tell them this tale 
would detect the imposition ; your speech would betray you. An En- 
glishman is the unfittest person on earth to argue another English- 
man into slavery." 

His Impeachment of Warren Hastings. — The culminat- 
ing point of Burke's career was the part he took in the 
trial of Warren Hastings for his misgovernment of India. 
In that majestic and solemn scene, Burke was the chief 
actor. His final address began on the 28th of May, and 
lasted for nine days. India and her wrongs was his sub- 
ject. It fired his imagination, and roused all the poet in 
him. The ruthless indignities to which a venerable land 
had been subjected, outraged his sense of justice, and kin- 
dled in him a furious zeal against the offenders. The 
effect on the audience was overpowering. Women fainted; 
breath failed men as they listened to the condemnation of 
this terrible judge. Warren Hastings was, in the end, 
acquitted, but the English policy in India has undergone 
as great a change as if he had been convicted. Burke has 
been called "the first apostle and great upholder of integ- 



EDMUND BtTHKl. 153 

rity, mercy/ and honor in the relation between his coun- 
trymen and their humble dependents." 

Burke and France. — The strongest influence that Burke 
exerted in his own time,, was through his discussion of 
French affairs : first, in the Reflections on the French 
Revolution, and later, in the Letters on a Regicide Peace. 
Burke had long watched France with disapproval and 
alarm. He had noted a dangerous growth of revolution- 
ary ideas, that boded no good to venerable French institu- 
tions. Events took precisely the turn that he had prophe- 
sied. What increased his alarm was the spread of the new 
ideas over Europe, and even into conservative England. 
Roused by what he regarded as the foolish and intemper- 
ate sympathy of many Englishmen with recent events in 
France, he turned to them with a passionate protest against 
the French Revolution. He loved the Past as a poet does ; 
while, as a statesman, he clung with strong conviction to 
the established order of things as the only safety of society. 
His attitude toward the French Revolution cost him the 
friendship of the Whigs, with whom he had hitherto fra- 
ternized ; and henceforth he frankly called himself a Tory. 
But while the Whig party disowned him, and the Whig 
papers advised him pointedly to resign his seat in Parlia- 
ment, there were others who hailed him as "the savior of 
Europe," and who declared that he had turned the tide of 
revolution. His Reflections were read far and wide, and 
had a powerful influence in checking the dangerous ten- 
dencies of that age. That Burke's view of the French 
Revolution was a fair one, most students of history would 
question ; but every reader must feel the vigor and splen- 
dor of his argument. 

The Last Years of Burke were sad and lonely. He was a 
high -tempered man, and made many enemies. " A hunt of 



154 EDMUND BURKE. 

obloquy/' he says, had pursued him all his life. Nearly 
every cause that he had undertaken had been unpopular. 
His eloquent appeal in behalf of America was one of many 
efforts that had failed utterly. In his old age a deep be- 
reavement overwhelmed him. He lost the son on whom 
he leaned. "The storm has gone over me/' he wrote, 
"and I lie like one of those old oaks which the late hurri- 
cane has scattered about me. I am stripped of all my 
honors ; I am torn up by the roots, and lie prostrate on 

the earth I am alone. I have none to meet my 

enemies in the gate I live in an inverted order. 

They who ought to have succeeded me, have gone before 
me. They who should have been to me as posterity, are 
in the place of ancestors." "Whether for thought or for 
action/' he wrote in the Regicide Peace, " I am at the end 
of my career." He died on the 9th of July, 1797. 

Burke as an Orator. — Edmund Burke was not a popular 
orator. He had not an imposing presence, or a fine voice. 
He had almost no humor, a quality indispensable in a 
speaker who pleases the multitude. " The length of his 
speeches, the profound and philosophical character of his 
argument, the splendor and often the extravagance of his 
illustrations, his passionate earnestness, his want of temper 
and discretion, wearied and perplexed the squires and mer- 
chants about him. He was known at last as ' the dinner- 
bell of the House/ so rapidly did its benches thin at his 
rising." Such is the testimony as to the oratory of Burke's 
later years. Even his best hearers, except on rare occa- 
sions, listened to him calmly. It was not till they read the 
speech that they found themselves under the spell of the 
orator. 

Burke as a Writer. — Swift, it has been seen, was the 
most powerful political writer of the early part of the 



EDMUND BURKE. 155 

eighteenth century; but Swift was a partisan, writing 
vehemently upon questions of the moment. Burke dis- 
missed the selfish and personal, and addressed himself only 
to the wisdom and goodness of men. He discussed great 
themes in a noble style. His writings unite elevation of 
feeling and excited imagination with lucid reasoning and 
concise expression. They unite, moreover, the ease of 
conversation — its short, vigorous sentences and idiomatic 
expression — with the grace and dignity of literary prose. 
The orator's habit of speaking gave clearness and force to 
his writing ; while the constant use of his pen gave pre- 
cision, dignity, and elegance to his expression. 

Suggestions for Reading. — On American Taxation, — On Concil- 
iation with America; — Macaulay's Essay on Warren Hastings; — 
Burke (English Men of Letters), Chapters IV., VI., and X. 



In this chapter we have considered: — 

1. Tlie Early Isife of Burke. 

2. Burke and America. 

3. His Impeachment of Warren Hastings. 
4:. Burke and France. 

5. The Last Years of Burke* 

6. Burke as an Orator. 

7. Burke as a Writer, 



CH&PTEE XV* 

OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 

(1T28-1774.) 

" No man was more foolish when he had not a pen in his hand, or 
more wise when he had." — Samuel Johnson. 

"He was a friend to virtue, and in his most playful pages never 
forgets what is due to it. A gentleness, delicacy, and purity of feel- 
ing distinguish whatever he wrote, and bear a correspondence to the 
generosity of a disposition which knew no bounds but his last guinea." 
— Walter Scott. 

" His elegant and enchanting style flowed from him with so much 
facility that in whole quires he had seldom occasion to correct or alter 
a single word." — Bishop Percy. 

"There was in his character much to love, but little to respect. 
His heart was soft even to weakness; he was so generous that he 
quite forgot to be just ; he forgave injuries so readily that he might 
be said to invite them ; and was so liberal to beggars that he had 
nothing left for his tailor and his butcher. He was vain, sensual, 
frivolous, profuse, improvident." — T. B. Macaulay. 

" Think of him reckless, thoughtless, vain, if you like — but merciful, 
gentle, generous, full of love and pity. His humor delighting us still ; 
his song fresh and beautiful as when first he charmed with it ; his 
words in all our mouths ; his very weaknesses beloved and familiar ; 
his benevolent spirit seems still to smile on us ; to do gentle kind- 
nesses ; to succor with sweet charity ; to soothe, caress, and forgive ; 
to plead with the fortunate for the unhappy and the poor." — W. If. 
Thackeray. 

Life. — Most people love poetry, novels, and plays ; and 
who that has written all three has written them so delight- 
fully as Oliver Goldsmith ? He is, by general consent, the 
most charming and versatile writer of the eighteenth cent- 



OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 157 

my. In his writings many traces of his personal history- 
are found. His father was an Irish curate, and twice, at 
least, the son made a loving study of his character. Dr. 
Primrose, the Vicar of Wakefield, is said to have been a 
faithful portrait of the Rev. Charles Goldsmith, Vicar of 
Lissoy ; while the village preacher of Sweet Auburn was 
also a picture of Goldsmith's father : — 

" A man he was to all the country dear, 
And passing rich with forty pounds a year; 
Remote from towns he ran his godly race, 
Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change his place. 

******* 
Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, 
And even his failings leaned to virtue's side ; 
But in his duty prompt at every call, 
He watched and wept, he prayed and felt for all. 

* ***** * 

At church, with meek and unaffected grace, 
His looks adorned the venerable place ; 
Truth from his lips prevailed with double sway, 
And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray." 

Oliver Goldsmith, scarred by the small-pox, was an ugly 
little fellow, and was thought by every one a dunce. On 
the play-ground, he was shy and awkward at the games 
in which other boys delighted. When seventeen years of age, 
he obtained a servant's scholarship at the University of 
Dublin, but did himself and his friends no credit at col- 
lege. His family had set their hearts on his entering one 
of the learned professions, and Goldsmith left not one of 
them untried. He attempted to enter the Church, but 
made his application in scarlet clothes, which settled the 
question in the Bishop's mind. He next tried a position 
as tutor, but with small success. His relatives tried to 
make a lawyer of him, and finally persuaded him to at- 
tempt medicine. He studied at Edinburgh and at Leyden. 
It was from Leyden that he started on that tramp through 



158 OLIYEE GOLDSMITH. 

Europe which is now so famous. Who has not heard the 
story of Goldsmith and his flute ? — how he wandered from 
village to village, playing for the peasants to dance on the 
green at nightfall, and so earning his supper and bed. It 
is not likely that he often went hungry, — that irresistibly 
good-natured young Irishman, with his ugly, comical face. 
"When Goldsmith came back to London, his life was still 
a wandering one. He found work in a chemist's shop ; he 
became a proof-reader in the establishment of the famous 
printer, Mr. Samuel Richardson ; he tried teaching once 
more. As a physician he had failed utterly. Some one 
advised Dr. Goldsmith never to prescribe for any but his 
enemies ! Finally, he obtained employment as a book- 
reviewer. This' was a dismal period of his life, but one 
not to be regretted. He was learning his trade as a writer. 
His literary apprenticeship was passed in writing school- 
books, prefaces, indexes, and reviews. In these years of 
obscure drudgery he composed the Letters from a Citizen 
of the World, giving a description of English life and man- 
ners in the assumed character of a Chinese traveler. He 
wrote a Life of Beau Nash ; and prepared a short and at- 
tractive History of England, in the form of Letters from 
a Nobleman to liis Son. He could not afford to write 
poetry, he said : "I cannot afford to court the draggle-tail 
muses, my lord ; they would let me starve ; but by my 
other labors I can make shift to eat, and drink, and have 
good clothes." He did occasionally turn aside from his 
daily drudgery to court the muses. His beautiful poem, 
The Traveler, appeared in 1764, and laid the foundation of 
his literary success. "There has not been so fine a poem 
since Pope's time," Dr. Johnson declared. Goldsmith be- 
came a remarkably popular and successful author. Many 
sentimental people think that the world used him very 
ill ; but it certainly sent him friends and appreciation 
sooner than most writers find them. He Avas little 



OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 159 

more than thirty before he was the friend of Burke, Key- 
nolds, and Johnson, and a welcome member of their brill- 
iant circle at The Club. He had not been long writing 
when his work commanded prices very respectable even by 
our present standards. But Goldsmith's folly and improvi- 
dence kept him plunged in debt. The inability to pay his 
tailor and his landlady pursued him through life. How 
The Vicar of Wakefield came into the world is a well- 
known story. Goldsmith's irate landlady having called in 
the sheriff, Goldsmith, in his turn, summoned Dr. John- 
son, who sent him a guinea to pacify the woman. When 
the Doctor arrived on the scene, Goldsmith had changed 
the guinea, and was making merry over a bottle of wine. 
Johnson put the cork into the bottle, and told Goldsmith 
to rouse himself at once and consider how money should 
be raised. "He then told me," says Johnson, "that he 
had a novel ready for the press, which he produced to me. 
I looked into it and saw its merit ; told the landlady I 
should soon return ; and having gone to a bookseller, sold 
it for £60. I brought Goldsmith the money, and he dis- 
charged his rent, not without rating his landlady in a high 
tone for having used him so ill." 

The publisher had bought and paid for the novel more 
out of courtesy to Dr. Johnson than because of any belief 
in it as a bargain. For two years the bookseller let it lie 
in his desk, until Goldsmith's Traveler had made his name 
of value. The Vicar of Wakefield was published in 1766, 
and has had a steady sale for a hundred and twenty years — 
a novel with a rare history. 

Four years later, Tlie Deserted Village appeared, and 
won Goldsmith new fame. In 1773, She Stoops to Conquer 
was first acted, and was a triumphant success. Honors in 
abundance were heaped upon Goldsmith in the last years 
of his life, but his unconquerable thriftlessness kept him 
the slave of the booksellers. " Honors to one in my situa- 



160 OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 

Hon/' said poor Goldsmith, " are something like ruffles to 
a man that wants a shirt." He died at the age of forty- 
six, deeply mourned by the circle of friends to whom his 
very weaknesses had endeared him. 

Goldsmith's Poetry. — Goldsmith, like Gray, produced 
little poetry, but what he did write was exquisite of its 
kind. Both of these men wrote in an age which encour- 
aged prose rather than poetry. In Goldsmith's Traveler 
and Deserted Village, we find, as in Gray's Elegy, the care 
and polish that Pope had taught. We find, however, 
something more. In Goldsmith there is a tenderness and 
sentiment that are new to the poetry of his century. Pope 
wrote intellectual poetry, but Goldsmith appeals to the 
heart. Dowden sums up the elements of The Traveler: 
"description, reflection, mirth, sadness, memory, and 
love." All these are found in Tlie Deserted Village. Each 
of these poems has, too, its moral. What Goldsmith 
teaches is, however, of trifling importance. In his tender, 
humorous, poetic description lies his charm. 

His Plays.— Goldsmith's two comedies are The Good- 
natured Man, a comedy of character, and She Stoops to 
Conquer, a comedy of intrigue. The hero of the first is " a 
good-natured man," "foolish, open-hearted, — and yet all 
his faults are such that one loves him still the better for 
them." He is a man shown "in his humor," as Ben Jon- 
son would have said, and that humor is over-amiability. 
She Stoops to Conquer depends for its interest not on its 
characters, but upon a series of lively and farcical incidents. 
Macaulay speaks of it as "an incomparable farce in five acts." 
The best proof of Goldsmith's success in this comedy is the 
constancy with which it has kept possession of the stage. 

The Vicar of Wakefield is a remarkable picture of happy 
domestic life to have been written by a homeless man, who 



OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 161 

tumbled about from one forlorn lodging-house to another. 
The novel is as faulty in plot as a novel could well be, and 
Goldsmith frankly tells us so in his preface. Astonishing 
things happen, yet they leave little impression on the 
reader. That which makes the life of the book is its por- 
trayal of character. The Vicar himself is one of the fore- 
most figures in English fiction. His wisdom of speech and 
simplicity of conduct are delightful. In him we love and 
revere piety and lofty sentiment, united with shrewd com- 
mon sense. The group of women in the book is depicted 
with the gentle satire and sly humor of Addison. The 
moral teaching of The Vicar of Wakefield is sweet and 
pure. (P. 330.) 

Goldsmith's style, like Addison's, has the charm of per- 
fect quiet and simplicity. In the writing of Addison and 
Goldsmith, there is no apparent effort, no uneasy search- 
ing for the right word, no straining after effect . And in 
both these men, the French saying, that the style is the 
man, is exemplified. Irving wrote of Goldsmith : — 

"The unforced humor, blending so happily with good feeling and 
good sense, and singularly dashed, at times, with a pleasing melan- 
choly ; even the very nature of his mellow and flowing and softly- 
tinted style, all seem to bespeak his moral as well as his intellectual 
qualities, and make us love the man at the same time that we admire 
the author." 

Suggestions for Reading. — The Deserted Village, Retaliation, 
She Stoops to Conquer, The Vicar of Wakefield; — Irving's Life of 
Goldsmith; — Goldsmith {English Men of Letters)', — Macaulay's Es- 
say on Goldsmith. 



In this chapter we have considered :■ 

1. Goldsmith's Life. 

2. His Poetry. 

3. Mis Plays. 

4z. The Vicar of Wakefield. 



CHAPTHE XVI* 

EDWARD GIBBON. 

(1737-1794.) 

"We may correct and improve from the stores which have been 
opened since Gibbon's time ; but the work of Gibbon as a whole, as 
the encyclopedic history of thirteen hundred years, as the grandest of 
historical designs, carried out alike with wonderful power and with 
wonderful accuracy, must ever keep its place. Whatever else is read, 
Gibbon must be read, too." — Edward A. Freeman. 

"We shall never have a greater historian in style as well as in 
matter, than Gibbon." — Saintsbury. 

Historians of the Eighteenth Century. — The eighteenth 
century, with its new development of prose, is famous 
for its historical writers. Hume, Robertson, and Gibbon 
gave history a place in literature that it had never held 
before. Some one has justly said that what was written 
before 1750, consisted of the materials of history, rather 
than of history itself ; in other words, that which ex- 
isted before 1750 has not lived in literature. The writ- 
ings mentioned in the first chapter of this book furnish 
valuable material to the historian, but it would be a misuse 
of language to call them historical literature. Sir Thomas 
More's Life of Edward V. is the first English history that 
deserves the name. The narrative of Hall, which traces the 
fortunes of the Houses of Lancaster and York,*is a valuable 
store-house of facts. The famous Holinshed's Chronicle 
was the standard history of England in Shakespeare's day. 
The Englishmen who had written before Raleigh, had dealt 



GIBBON. 163 

only with their own country. He entered a wider field, and 
undertook the History of the World. The only historian 
of mark in the seventeenth century was Hyde, Earl of 
Clarendon, who wrote the History of the Great Rebellion. 
The eighteenth century brought a new spirit and method, 
and with Hume, Robertson, and Gibbon, began the modern 
science of history. (1.) David Hume was a Scotchman, a 
free-thinker in religion, and a philosopher. He wrote the 
History of England, a clear, vivacious, thoughtful, and 
philosophic work. He lacked the patience needed for 
laborious research among original authorities ; and the 
fact that his work rests on material gathered by preceding 
writers, detracts from his greatness as an historian. (2.) 
William Robertson wrote a History of Scotland, a History 
of America, and The History of the Emperor Charles the 
Fifth of Germany. The last is his most important work. 
His narrative was eloquent, and his descriptions were vivid 
and picturesque ; but Robertson, too, was lacking in accu- 
racy of research. The most eminent historical writer of 
this group was Gibbon. 

Life. — Edward Gibbon was born in 1737. Being a sickly 
boy, he received no regular schooling. He was, however, a 
voracious reader, devouring history, he tells us, like so 
many novels. The result of this lawless education, he 
continues, was ff erudition that might have puzzled a 
doctor, and ignorance of which a school-boy should have 
been ashamed." When Gibbon was sixteen, his father 
sent him to Oxford, where he spent two years. There he 
became a Roman Catholic. His family at once hurried 
him away to Switzerland, and placed him under the care 
of an eminent Protestant theologian. This worthy man 
was entrusted with the task of bringing his pupil back 
to the Protestant fold, a task accomplished in eighteen 
months. In Switzerland Gibbon began a course of sys- 



164 GIBBON. 

tematic study, that gradually made him one of the most 
learned men of his time. A scholar by nature, he was in- 
deed a self-taught, self-made man ; for he was always his 
own best tutor. He wished, for instance, to improve his 
Latin, and he set about it in this way : — 

" I translated an epistle of Cicero into French, and after throwing 
it aside till the words and phrases were obliterated from my memory, 
I retranslated my French into such Latin as I could find, and then 
compared each sentence of my imperfect version with the ease, the 
grace, the propriety of the Roman orator." 

Gibbon early had a love for Latin, and a strong interest 
in all that concerned old Roman life, — an intimation of the 
turn that his thoughts were to take in later years. 

In Switzerland, moreover, Gibbon acquired sympathy 
with European life and thought, as distinguished from the 
English life and thought in which he had been reared. 
For four years he did not use the English language ; and 
when he wrote his first essay, on the Study of Literature, 
he composed it, as a matter of course, in French. He not 
only talked and wrote, he thought French. Mme. du 
Deffand said to him, " You take such pains to be a French- 
man, that you deserve to have been born one." Gibbon's 
love affair is a well-known story. He became attached to 
the good, learned, and beautiful Mile. Curchod ; inexor- 
able j>arents forbade the marriage, and the two lovers went 
their separate ways. Mile. Curchod became the wife of 
the famous Necker, and the mother of Mme. de Stael. 
Gibbon never married. 

In 1764 Gibbon took the memorable journey to Italy 
that decided his future. He tells us : — 

"It was at Rome, on the 15th October, 1764, as I sat musing 
amid the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefooted friars were sing- 
ing vespers in the Temple of Jupiter, that the idea of writing the 
decline and fall of the city first started to my mind." 



GIBBOtf. 165 

This plan was long contemplated "at an awful distance." 
It was not till eight years after, when he returned to Lon- 
don, that Gibbon set himself to work. He was three years 
in preparing his first volume for the public. This ap- 
peared in 1776. He had been so doubtful about its recep- 
tion that he entreated the publisher to prepare not more 
than five hundred copies. But edition after edition was 
called for. The book was a "mad success," his biographer 
declares. Gibbon went steadily on with his work, and 
finished the six volumes of his history at the rate of one 
volume in two years. Meanwhile, he had taken a seat in 
Parliament, but political questions of the Present had little 
attraction for him. His mind was filled with the Past, and 
he was glad to escape to his retreat at Lausanne, where he 
could devote himself, without interruption, to the comple- 
tion of his work. He describes the close of his great task 
as he did the beginning : — 

" It was on the day, or rather night, of the 27th of June, 1787, be- 
tween the hours of eleven and twelve, that I wrote the last lines of the 
last page, in a summer house in my garden. After laying down my 
pen, I took several turns in a berceau, or covered walk of acacias, 
which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, and the moun- 
tains. The air was temperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of 
the moon was reflected from the waters, and all nature was silent. I 
will not dissemble the first emotions of joy on the recovery of my 
freedom, and perhaps the establishment of my fame. But my pride 
was soon humbled, and a sober melancholy was spread over my mind 
by the idea that I had taken an everlasting leave of an old and agree- 
able companion ; and that, whatsoever might be the future fate of my 
history, the life of the historian must be short and precarious." 

Gibbon died in London, in 1794, at the age of fifty- 
seven. 

The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman 
Empire is one of the greatest monuments of human in- 
dustry and genius. Gibbon was a man of daring scholar- 



166 GIBBON. 

ship and invincible perseverance. He undertook a sub- 
ject more vast, perhaps, than was ever before attempted by 
an historian. His story begins with the reign of Trajan, 
a.d. 98, and closes with the fall of the Eastern Empire, in 
1453. These thirteen and a half centuries include not only 
the slow decline of the Eoman Empire, but also the irrup- 
tion of the barbarians, the establishment of the Byzantine 
power, the reorganization of the European nations, the 
foundation of the religious and political system of Moham- 
medanism, and the Crusades. The subject-matter that 
Gibbon moulded into shape is eloquently set before us by 
the French historian Guizot : — 

" The gradual decline of the most extraordinary dominion which 
has ever invaded and oppressed the world ; the fall of that immense 
empire, erected on the ruins of so many kingdoms, republics, and 
states both barbarous and civilized; and forming in its turn, by its 
dismemberment, a multitude of states, republics, and kingdoms; 
the annihilation of the religion of Greece and Rome; the birth and 
the progress of the two new religions which have shared the most 
beautiful regions of the earth; the decrepitude of the ancient world, 
the spectacle of its expiring glory and degenerate manners ; the in- 
fancy of the modern world, the picture of its first progress, of the 
new direction given to the mind and character of man — such a sub- 
ject must necessarily fix the attention and excite the interest of man, 
who cannot behold with indifference those memorable epochs, dur- 
ing which, in the fine language of Corneille, ' Un grand destin com- 
mence, un grand destin s'acheve.' " 

(1.) That Gibbon could give shape and unity to such a 
mass of events is the first merit of his history. 

(2.) The second merit is its originality, for Gibbon 
trusted to no other man's labors. Much of his material 
had to be patiently gathered from the rubbish of the 
Byzantine annalists, and from the wild stories of the 
Eastern chroniclers. To bring light and order out of 
this chaos, the historian had to make himself familiar 



GIBBON. 167 

with philosophy, religion, science, jurisprudence, and war, 
as they contributed to the civilization of the nations and 
ages described by him. 

(3.) Gibbon showed the genius of the scholar in the prep- 
aration of his material ; but this would have availed him 
little with posterity if he had not also possessed the genius 
of the writer. He himself says that he wrote and rewrote 
before attaining the style that he aimed at : "a middle 
tone between a dull chronicle and a rhetorical declama- 
tion/'' The stately tread of his sentences reminds the 
reader that he was the friend and admirer of Dr. Johnson ; 
but if Gibbon's style is pompous, it may be urged that his 
subject is full of pomp. History will bear a more sonorous 
style than will any other kind of prose. " There is some- 
thing truly epic in these later volumes," says Morison. 
" Tribes, nations, and empires are the characters; one 
after another they come forth like Homeric heroes, and 
do their mighty deeds before the assembled armies. The 
grand and lofty chapters on Justinian ; on the Arabs ; on 
the Crusades, have a rounded completeness, coupled with 
such artistic subordination to the main action, that they 
read more like cantos of a great prose poem than the ordi- 
nary staple of historical composition." (P. 336.) 

No author lays himself open to fiercer criticism than the 
historian. Literary critics attack his style ; scholars pick 
flaws in his statements ; and, in Gibbon's case, the theo- 
logians have joined in denouncing him as the foe of 
Christianity. He has been regarded as one of the most 
dangerous enemies by whom the Christian faith has been 
assailed. Earnest men have taken up weapons against 
him, and, in some instances, have been betrayed by their 
zeal into an unfair warfare upon him. Lack of moral en- 
thusiasm and elevation is, however, a marked defect of 
Gibbon. 



168 GIBBON. 

Suggestions for Reading. — Decline and Fall of the Roman 
Empire, Chapters LVIII. and LIX, on The Crusades ;— Gibbon {En- 
glish Men of Letters), Chapters VII. and IX. 



tn this chapter we have considered: — 

1. The Historians of the Eighteenth Century, 

2. The IAfe of Gibbon. 

3. Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. 



CHAPTER XV!L 

ROBERT BURNS. 

(1T59 -1796.) 

"Whose lines are mottoes of the heart, 
Whose truths electrify the sage." — Campbell. 

" Burns is by far the greatest poet that ever sprung from the bosom 
of the people and lived and died in an humble condition." — Professor 
Wilson. 

" he was a good-looking fine fellow! — he was that; rather black 
an' ill-colored; but he couldna nelp that, ye ken. He was a strong, 
manly-looking chap ; nane o' your skilpit milk-and-water dandies : but 
a sterling, substantial fellow, who wadna hae feared the deil suppose 
he had met him. An' then siccan an ee he had ! " — Memoir of Burns! 

1 ' His person was strong and robust, his manners rustic, not clown- 
ish ; a sort of dignified plainness and simplicity which received part 
of its effect perhaps from one's knowledge of his extraordinary talents. 

. . . . I think his countenance was more massive than it looks 

in any of the portraits There was a strong expression of 

sense and shrewdness in all his lineaments; the eye alone, I think, in- 
dicated the poetical temperament. It was large and of a dark cast, 
and glowed (I say literally glowed) when he spoke with feeling or in- 
terest. I never saw such another eye in a human head, though I 
have seen the most distinguished men in my time. His conversation 
expressed perfect self-confidence without the slightest presumption." 
—Sir Walter Scott. 

" None but the most narrow-minded bigots think of his errors and 
frailties but with sympathy and indulgence ; none but the blindest 
enthusiasts can deny their existence." — James Eogg. 

"As a poet, Burns stands in the front rank. His conceptions are 
all original ; his thoughts are new and weighty ; his style unborrowed ; 
and he owes no honor to the subjects which his muse selected, for they 
are ordinary, and such as would have tempted no poet, save himself, 
to sing about.'*— Allan Cunningham. 



170 BURNS. 

Poets of the Later Part of the Eighteenth Century. — We 

have studied in Pope the writer who best represents the 
poetry of the early part of the eighteenth century. The 
poetry of the town and of high life had been cultivated by 
the Augustan writers ; towards the close of the century the 
English poets began to find their inspiration in country life 
and in humble men and women. (1.) Thomson's Seasons 
was the first poetry that led people to Nature. It began to 
train a taste that was to find its highest delight in Words- 
worth. (2.) Gray, in the Elegy in a Country Churchyard, 
takes for his theme "the rude forefathers of the hamlet." 
Poets had not heretofore thought it worth while to write 
of the poor and humble, to sing of man simply as man. 
Now we see stirring in English poetry the great theme — 
Liberty, Equality, Fraternity — that was thrilling all Europe 
in the last century. (3.) Cowper's Task describes the daily 
course of his quiet home life, his country walks, and winter 
evenings by the fire, his 

"Home-born happiness, 
Fireside enjoyments, intimate delights." 

And mingled with these pleasant themes are his thoughts 
on the great questions of his day. He was an original 
writer, and in nothing more original than in leaving be- 
hind the old forms of poetic expression, and in inventing 
for himself a simple, natural style. 

But of all the poets of the eighteenth century, the man 
who sang of Nature and Man most tenderly and passion- 
ately, with the simplest and most natural feeling and ex- 
pression, the man who was the truest poet, was Eobert 
Burns. 

Life. — He was born at the hamlet of Alloway, in Ayrshire, 
and was the son of a farmer of the humblest class. As 
Goldsmith left us the portrait of his father, so Burns, in 



BURKS. 171 

the Cotter's Saturday Night, has portrayed the fine old 
Scotch peasant,, William Burns : — ■ 

" The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face, 

They round the ingle, form a circle wide ; 
The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace, 

The big ha'-Bible, ance his father's pride. 
His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside, 

His lyart haffets wearing thin an' bare ; 
Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide, 

He wales a portion with judicious care, 
And ' Let us worship God ! ' he says, with solemn air. 
******* 
Then kneeling down, to Heaven's Eternal King, 

The saint, the father, and the husband prays." 

Poor as these people were, books and education were a 
necessity to them. Eobert Burns sat at the table to eat, 
with a spoon in one hand and a book in the other, and 
carried a volume in his pocket to read in the fields. "I 
pored over it driving my cart/' he said, "or walking 
to labor, song by song, verse by verse, carefully noting 
the true, tender, sublime, or fustian." Popular education 
was at that time more general in Scotland than in any 
other country of Europe ; and Burns had received the 
training of the common school. The Spectator, and the 
volumes of Pope, Thomson, and Sterne were on the 
shelves in his father's cottage, and Burns early made 
himself familiar with the masterpieces of English liter- 
ature. 

He grew up a farm-laborer. "This kind of life, the 
cheerless gloom of a hermit, with the unceasing moil of a 
galley-slave, brought me to my sixteenth year, when love 
made me a poet." The song of Handsome Nell revealed to 
Burns a talent which proved to be the keenest happiness 
of his hard life : — 

"My chief, amaist my only pleasure." 



172 BUEHS. 

He had been ten years rhyming to please himself, when, 
being in special need of money, he pnt together his verses 
and tried their fortune with the public. They were printed, 
and copies found their way to Edinburgh. Burns was 
cordially advised to bring out an edition of his poems 
there, and to come in person to superintend the publi- 
cation. Meanwhile, weary of the struggle with poverty, 
he had determined to cross the ocean and seek his fortune 
in the West Indies. On the last night that he expected 
to be in Scotland, he wrote in deep despondency, 
"The gloomy night is gathering fast." But the clouds 
broke with the dawn. There came the summons from 
Edinburgh, and the voyage to the New World was aban- 
doned. 

He says : "I immediately posted to Edinburgh, without 
a single acquaintance, or letters of introduction." But he 
needed none. His songs had gone before him. The new 
edition of his poems was received with enthusiasm, and 
"the Ayrshire Ploughman" was the lion of the season. 
The fashionable world tried to capture him for its draw- 
ing-rooms, lovely ladies petted and courted him, while 
grave and learned men welcomed him as their equal. The 
success of his poems gave him money to gratify his desire 
for travel, and he spent the summer of 1787 in visiting the 
places in Scotland most famous for their beauty or historic 
interest. He returned to Edinburgh the next winter, hop- 
ing that some substantial good might come from the praise 
and friendship he had won. He found that Edinburgh 
had relapsed into indifference, and that his new friends 
were not to be counted on. He went home an embittered 
man, and the record of his last years is sorrowful to read. 
All his life he had been a lover of good company. No 
merry-making was quite complete till the handsome, witty, 
lovable Robbie Burns joined in. He was always ready to 
drink every toast, to laugh and sing, and carouse till dawn. 



BURKS. 173 

The next day found him with a heavy head and a heavy 
heart. In 1791, five years before his death, Burns gave up 
his luckless farming, and moved with his wife and children 
to Dumfries. He was at this time employed as a gauger of 
liquors. He grew daily more reckless and irregular in his 
life. 

Yet there were some bright days still ; for to the last ten 
years of Burns' life belong his most characteristic work. 
An Edinburgh publisher wishing to make a collection of 
old Scottish songs, told Burns of the project, roused his 
enthusiasm, and was promised by the poet all the aid in 
his power. Burns set down the words that he had heard 
crooned over and over from his babyhood,. — here and there 
he touched a line, or added a stanza — oftener, he threw 
away the song entirely, and set the old tune to words of 
his own. To Johnson's Musical Museum he contributed 
one hundred and eighty-four songs that he had revised or 
written. To another collection he gave sixty. These gems 
of poetry were Burns' free gift to the world. Although 
his writings had by this time a substantial market value, 
he refused to take a penny for his songs. They were the 
purest delight of his last years. But at thirty-six he was 
broken in health and spirit. His passionate, turbulent 
life had worn him out. His death, in 1796, was received 
with an outburst of -grief from the nation, and from that 
day the memory of Robert Burns has been one of Scotland's 
proudest treasures. 

The Poetry of Burns is, first of all, simple, natural, and 
sincere. His poems grew out of his own experience ; they 
come straight from his heart, and go straight to ours. (1.) 
He writes of real people and real events. Scotch lads and 
lassies take the place of the shepherds and shepherdesses 
with Latin names who had overrun English poetry. His 
sentiment is deep and tender. The genuineness, simplicity,, 



174 BURKS. 

and intensity of his poems of love may be seen in such 
lines as: — 

" Had we never lov'd sae kindly, 
Had we never lov'd sae blindly, 
Never met — or never parted, 
We had ne'er been broken-hearted." 

Scott said that these four lines contained "the essence of 
a thousand love-tales." 

Although Burns is first, perhaps, the poet of love, yet 
many other elements enter into his verse. (2.) He dwelt 
on a remote Ayrshire farm, but he was keenly alive to the 
stirring events of the American and the French Revolution. 
Burns was a natural thinker. His mind was made up on 
all the great questions of the day, and into his poetry went 
his free, fearless opinions. His famous poem, "A Man's 
a Man for a' That," has the ring of our own Declaration 
of Independence. (3.) Burns was bitter and scornful 
when he saw some of the forms that religion took in his 
own country. He was unsparing in his satire of bigotry 
and hypocrisy. (4.) The interest in Nature that we have 
discovered in the poetry of this period is to be found in 
Burns ; but with him it is always secondary to the human 
interest. When he writes of the "banks an' braes o* bonie 
Doon," it is not to tell us of the " bonie Doon," but of a 
young girl who has lost her lover : — 

" Ye banks an' braes o' bonie Doon, 

How can ye bloom sae fresh an' fair ? 
How can ye chant, ye little birds, 

An' I sae weary fu' o' care! 
Thou'll break my heart, thou warbling bird, 

That wantons thro' the flowering thorn: 
Thou minds me o' departed joys, 

Departed never to return." 

In the exquisite lines on the Mountain Daisy, Burns 
again makes the interest a human one before he ends the 



BURKS. 175 

poem. This tenderness for the daisy, and the gentleness 
and pity toward the mouse — the "wee, sleekit, cowrin, 
timorous beastie," whose nest has been turned up by his 
plough, — these may belong to the new poetry, but they 
belong also to the loving heart of Burns himself. 

(5.) His love for Scotland entered into all his poetry. 
His strongest desire was 

" That I for poor auld Scotland's sake 
Some usefu' plan or book could make, 
Or sing a sang at least." 

A patriotic lyric that stirs the blood like a bugle-call, is 
Burns' 

" Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled, 
Scots, wham Bruce has often led." 

(6.) The humor and pathos of Burns are such as we 
might look to find in so generously gifted a nature. There 
was a passionate tenderness in Highland Mary and Mary 
in Heaven " that thirled the heart-strings thro' the breast " 
of every sensitive reader. 

No other poem of Burns shows so many of his best quali- 
ties as Tarn o' Shanter. It is an admirable piece of story- 
telling : a livelier narrative poem is not to be found. It is 
full of fine description ; there are shrewd character-draw- 
ing and vivid scenes from Nature. Burns loved a storm : — 

" The wind blew as 'twad blawn its last; 
The rattling showers rose on the blast ; 
The speedy gleams the darkness swallowed ; 
Loud, deep, and lang the thunder bellowed ; 
That night, a child might understand, 
The deil had business on his hand." 

The rollicking fun of Tarn o' Shanter makes it a master- 
piece of humor. 



176 BURKS. 

■ " The mirth and fun grew fast and furious," 

as Burns wrote on, till the poem is wound up to a frenzy 
of absurdity and terror. 

But the songs of Robert Burns are, after all, what en- 
dear him to the world. He is the foremost lyric poet of 
Scotland, and of the English literature. (P. 339.) 

Suggestions for Reading. — The Cotter's Saturday Night, The 
Twa Dogs, Tarn o' Shanter, Poor Mailie's Elegy, To a Mountain 
Daisy, To a Mouse, Mary Morison, Tarn Glen, Highland Mary, To 
Mary in Heaven, My Luve is like a Red, Red Rose, John Anderson, 
My Jo ; — Ward's English Poets, Essay on Burns ; — Carlyle's Essay 
on Burns, 



In this chapter we have considered : — 

1. Poets of the Later Part of the Eighteenth Century. 

2. IAfe of Bums. 

3. Characteristics of his Poetry. 



CHAPTEH XVIH* 

WALTER SCOTT. 

(1771-1832.) 
" Scott, the delight of generous boys." — Emerson. j 

" Blessings and prayers in nobler retinue 
Than sceptred king or laureled conqueror knows, 
Follow this wondrous potentate." — Wordsworth. 

" No sounder piece of British manhood was put together in that 
eighteenth century of Time." — Carlyle. 

" The chronicler, taking up his pen, wrote in lines of light the annals 
of the chivalrous and heroic days of auld feudal Scotland. The na- 
tion then, for the first time, knew the character of its ancestors. . . . 
We know now the character of our own people as it showed itself in 
war and peace — in palace, castle, hall, hut, hovel, and shieling — 
through centuries of advancing civilization." — Prof. John Wilson. 

Scott and Burns. — When Burns made his famous visit 
to Edinburgh, his ardent admirer, "Walter Scott, was a lad 
of fifteen. A memorable incident of Scott's boyhood oc- 
curred one night when, to his delight, he found himself 
actually in the presence of the poet. The talk of the 
company was about a picture which Burns held in his 
hand. Some lines were written below it, and all were trying 
in vain to recall the author, when young Scott modestly 
supplied the name. Burns gave him a word and a look 
that he treasured as long as he lived. This was the first 
and last meeting of the two men whose fame Scotland 
holds so dear. They both loved her, and found their best 
inspiration in her old songs and ballads, in the beauty of 
her scenery, and the romance of her history. 



178 WALTER SCOTT. 

The New Taste for Ballad Poetry. — In considering the 
literary influences that surrounded Scott, we should take 
account of the newly developed taste for old ballad poetry. 
In 1765 Bishop Thomas Percy published a collection of old 
ballads under the title of Reliques of Ancient English 
Poetry. Many of these poems had been preserved from 
early times only in manuscript, while others were roughly 
printed on single sheets, for circulation among the lower 
orders of people. Many writers before Percy, — men of 
taste and culture, like Sir Philip Sidney and Addison, — 
had felt the rude charm, the spirit and fire, of these an- 
cient ballads. Said Sidney, " I never heard the old song 
of Percy and Douglas, that I found not my heart more 
moved than with a trumpet." Addison, in The Spectator, 
had written an elaborate and appreciative criticism of the 
Ballad of Chevy Chase. Cray, a man of exquisite culture, 
had loved the wild poetry of an earlier age. But interest 
was not thoroughly roused till Bishop Percy put the bal- 
lads before the public in a readable form. He found that 
the oldest and most interesting could be traced to the 
frontier region between England and Scotland, which had 
been the scene of such striking incidents of border war- 
fare as those recorded in the noble ballads of Chevy Chase 
and the Battle of Otterourn. Many had been composed 
in the fifteenth century, in the barren period of English 
literature between Chaucer and Spenser. Bishop Percy 
gave also specimens of songs and ballads belonging to a 
comparatively late period of English history. The chief 
interest of his collection, and his chief service to literature, 
consists, however, in the older Reliques. The influence of 
this book was very marked. It was studied eagerly by 
each succeeding generation of English writers, and gave 
the first direction to the genius of more than one young 
poet. The boyish enthusiasm of Walter Scott was stirred 
by the vivid recitals of the old Border minstrels. " The 



WALTER SCOTT. 179 

first time," said he, "I could scrape a few shillings to- 
gether — which were not common occurrences with me — I 
bought unto myself a copy of those beloved volumes ; nor 
do I believe I ever read a book half so frequently, or with 
half the enthusiasm." 

Life of Scott. — Walter Scott was born in Edinburgh in 
1771. He was connected, both by the father's and by the 
mother's side, with several of those ancient, historic Bor- 
der families, whose warlike memories gave him material 
for his romances. Scott's delicate health in boyhood proved 
an important influence upon his later life. He was sent 
for country air to his grandfather's farm, to a region 
"in which every field has its battle, and every rivu- 
let its song." He lived much in the open air, and for 
hours together would lie on the grass gazing up into the 
sky, already entertaining himself in that enchanted world 
to which he afterwards led so many readers. He was 
petted by a devoted aunt, and was fairly pampered with 
stories. His lameness made him, moreover, a great reader. 
He devoured Eastern tales, fairy stories, and romances ; 
while Pope's Homer was dearer to him than any other 
poetry. The boy outgrew his invalid condition, though 
his lameness left him with a slight limp to the end of his 
life. He was sent to the High School, and then to the 
University of Edinburgh. Although his school and col- 
lege career was by no means glorious, the teachers who 
called him a dunce were obliged before many years to 
change their minds. He lived, indeed, to regret the neg- 
lected opportunities of his school-days ; and he writes in 
his autobiography that he has felt " pinched and ham- 
pered by his ignorance through every part of his literary 
career." At the age of fifteen, he entered his father's law 
office as an "apprentice," and by 1792 was a full-fledged 
lawyer. At about this time he made the acquaintance of 



180 WALTEE SCOTT. 

the Scottish Highlands. His holiday excursions had no 
motive but pleasure ; but, said his companion, " He was 
makin' himsell a' the time. He didna ken maybe what he 
was about till years had passed ; at first, he tho't o' little, 
I dare say, but the queerness and the fun." Romance, 
poetry, and history were far more attractive to Scott than 
his law-books. His first appearance before the public was 
through an English version of a German poem. "Upon 
my word, Walter Scott is going to turn out a poet," said a 
lady who read the translation. He was then twenty-three, 
but several years pass before we hear of him again as an 
author. This time he is a collector, following in the steps 
of Bishop Percy. The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border 
contained the tales and ballads that for years Scott had 
been gathering in his holiday wanderings over Scottish 
hill and dale. He had made friends with the old crones of 
the country-side, and had jotted down in his note-book the 
ballads they had crooned to him. From collecting the 
songs of the old minstrels, it was but a step to writing bal- 
lads of his own. Indeed, if one were to trace the growth 
of Scott's writings, he might set it down somewhat in this 
fashion : Percy's Reliques, the ballads that he read ; Min- 
strelsy of the Scottish Border, the ballads that he col- 
lected ; then The Lay of the Last Minstrel, Marmion, 
The Lady of the Lake, the ballads that he wrote ; and, 
last, his novels, which are but his poems still, cut loose 
from rhyme and rhythm. 

Scott was in 1799 appointed Sheriff of Selkirkshire, with 
an income that relieved him from petty cares, and gave 
him leisure to enter upon a literary life. The success of 
The Lay of the Last Minstrel, published in 1805, when he 
was thirty-four years old, decided his career. Poem after 
poem followed — Marmion, The Lady of the' Lake, Don 
Roderick. They were received with rapturous enthusiasm. 
Scott was the literary lion of London and Edinburgh, but 



WALTEE SCOTT. 181 

his steady head was not turned. His fine good sense sus- 
tained him when the tide began to turn, and Roheby, Tri- 
vrmain, and The Lord of the Isles were, one after the 
other, received with fainter and fainter applause. The 
public was tired of the poet Scott. Byron's last poem was 
now the sensation of the hour. With his quiet, manly 
courage, Scott made no complaint, but turned his own 
thoughts in a different direction. 

Years before, he had tossed off a few chapters of a novel, 
and had thought them worth submitting to a friend. The 
friend discouraged him, and he threw the novel aside, 
without further thought of prose composition. Nine years 
after, when he saw that poetry was failing him, he exam- 
ined these opening chapters, and determined to finish the 
novel. In three weeks he had written the last two volumes 
of Waverley, and in a few weeks more it was the talk of 
the town. The book was published without the author's 
name, but many were shrewd enough to guess Scott's se- 
cret. The Great Unknown, says Carlyle, was " like a 
king traveling incognito" During the seventeen years 
between 1814 and 1831, Scott wrote his long series of 
novels, and with such inconceivable facility that, on an 
average, two appeared each year. During this period he 
was also writing history, criticism, and biography. The 
impulse to this extraordinary activity was Scott's passion- 
ate and long-cherished ambition to found a baronial estate, 
and to lead himself the life of a country magnate. In 
1811 he had bought a hundred acres on the banks of the 
Tweed, and now, encouraged by the immense profits from 
his writings, he purchased one piece of land after another, 
planted and improved the estate, and gradually trans- 
formed his cottage into a castle. At Abbot sford Scott ex- 
ercised a princely hospitality, entertaining the wits and 
the bores, the princes and the beggars, of every land. The 
greater part of his writing was done before his guests were 



182 WALTER SCOTT. 

out of bed. He rose at five, and wrote till the nine-o'clock 
breakfast, then wrote two hours more, and by noon was 
"his own man." 

To enlarge his income, Scott had meanwhile engaged 
secretly in commercial speculations, together with the 
printing and publishing firm of the Ballantynes, his inti- 
mate friends and former school-fellows. In 1825 the Bal- 
lantynes failed, and Scott, at the age of fifty-five, found 
himself financially ruined. By availing himself of the 
bankrupt law, he might have escaped the payment of the 
vast sums that his firm owed ; but his sense of honor was 
so delicate that he resolutely set himself to pay off, by un- 
ceasing literary toil, debts amounting to one hundred and 
seventeen thousand pounds. He left Abbotsford, took 
humble lodgings in Edinburgh, and wrote early and late. 
Woodstock was his first novel after his misfortune. It was 
written in three months, and brought him £8,228. The 
nine volumes of the Life of Napoleon followed, and for 
that work he received £18,000. Thus encouraged, he 
toiled on, determined to pay the last guinea due to the 
creditors of his firm. Volume after volume came from 
his pen, and he had all but reached the goal, when wearied 
mind and body could toil no longer. He was sent to Italy 
in the vain hope of re-establishing his health ; but he came 
back to Scotland only to die. On the 21st of September, 
1832, he breathed his last, at Abbotsford. His body was 
buried in the beautiful old ruin of Dry burgh Abbey. 

Character of Scott. — During the whole of a long and 
active career, Scott had hardly an enemy or a misunder- 
standing. He was the delight of society ; for his conversa- 
tion, though unpretending, kindly, and jovial, was full of 
old-world lore, acute and picturesque observation, and racy 
anecdote. There never was an author more totally free from 
the affectations of genius. He went through the world 



WALTER SCOTT. 183 

simply, a man among men, — a capable sheriff and clerk of 
sessions, a good neighbor, a faithful friend. " God bless 
thee, Walter, my man \" said his old uncle. " Thou hast 
risen to be great, but thou wast always good." 

The Poetry of Scott. — The narrative poems of Scott 
were read with delight, because in subject, treatment, and 
verse they were new to the public. He was the first to in- 
terest readers in the legends and exploits of the Middle 
Ages. He was the first to introduce them to the beauty 
and romance of the Border country. "He turned the 
Highlands from a wilderness at the thought of which cul- 
ture shuddered, into a place of universal pilgrimage." 
It was this freshness of matter that made the first charm 
of Scott's poetry. Tlie Lay of the Last Minstrel, Mar- 
mion, and The Lady of the Lake, undoubtedly reveal its 
best qualities. Scott himself said that the interest of the 
Lay depended mainly upon the style ; that of Marmion, 
upon the descriptions ; that of The Lady of the Lake, 
upon the incidents. The plots of these tales in verse are 
neither very probable nor very logically constructed, nor 
are the characters drawn with much skill. But both story 
and characters are so conceived as to allow the poet con- 
stant opportunity for striking situations aud picturesque 
episodes. His poems are spirited and energetic ; they are 
full of action rather than of reflection or feeling. He 
himself said : "1 am sensible that if there be anything 
good about my poetry or prose either, it is a hurried 
frankness of composition, which pleases soldiers, sailors, 
and young people of bold and active dispositions." 
In picturesque narrative verse Scott has never been sur- 
passed ; but his poetry is at the present day most valued 
for the beauty of its descriptive passages. As the com- 
panion of the traveler in Scotland, it has its most delight- 
ful use. 



184 WALTER SCOTT. 

" Not Katrine in its mirror blue 
Gives back the shaggy banks more true " 

than The Lady of The Lalce reflects the beauty of the 
Highlands. No photographs of Scottish scenery convey 
its grandeur and loveliness so well ; for Scott's pictures 
have always great beauty of color, — deep, rich greens, and 
the blue of sky and water. (P. 348.) 

Scott's Novels. — Scott wisely abandoned verse, and wrote 
his romances in prose. His excellence as a novelist, like 
his excellence as a poet, lies in narration and description 
rather than in analysis or dramatic presentation of charac- 
ter. Scott was the prince of story-tellers. His novels are 
crowded with picturesque and absorbing incidents. Here, 
as in his poems, his aim was to produce striking pictorial 
situations rather than a closely woven plot. Here, also, 
he is great in description. The costumes and scenery of 
his novels are lavish and splendid. His treatment of char- 
acter is that of a shrewd, genial, sensible man who is a 
keen observer, and who reports accurately what he sees. 
His heroes and heroines were drawn with least skill. It 
is in his minor characters, and especially those of humble 
life, that we see Scott at his best. As Scott's plots were 
rapidly and carelessly constructed, so were his sentences. 
While his style is genial and easy, it has many of the faults 
of hurried work. He wrote with marvelous speed and 
industry. A party of young men were one day standing 
at a window in Edinburgh, when their host bade them 
watch a certain window in the opposite house. A hand 
appeared, tossing down at regular intervals page after page 
of manuscript upon a rising heap. " It is the same every 
night/' said the host; "I can't stand the sight of it 
when I am not at my books. Still it goes on unwearied, — 
and so it will be till candles are brought in, and nobody 
knows how long after that." The mysterious hand be- 



WALTER SCOTT. 185 

longed to Walter Scott, and the book that he was writing 
was Waverley. 

The author of Ivanhoe wrote without distinct moral pur- 
pose ; but the tone of Scott, man and writer, is chivalrous 
and elevating. No boy or girl can read the Waverley 
Novels without loving better 

" Trouthe and honour, f redom and curteisie. " 
Scott has helped to form the ideals of many " generous 
boys." At the same time he has done them a service in 
adding a new interest and delight to their lessons in his- 
tory. Scholars may detect errors here and there, but no one 
can dispute the fact that Scott has added more than any 
one historian to the knowledge and appreciation of the Past. 
(P. 356.) 

His novels are founded upon Scottish, English, and 
Continental history. Scott wrote other romances that 
may be classed as Personal, being founded upon private 
life or family legend. These deal for the most part with 
purely Scottish scenery and character. The following ar- 
rangement will assist the memory in recalling this large 
and varied cycle of works : — 

I.— HISTORICAL. 

I. — SCOTTISH ...... Waverley. The Period of the Pretender's attempt in 

* 1745. 

The Legend of Montrose. The Civil War in the seven- 
teenth century. 

Old Mortality. The Rebellion of the Covenanters. 

The Monastery, { The deposition and imprisonment of 

The Abbot. > Mary Queen of Scots. 

The Fair Maid of Perth. The Reign of Robert III. 

Castle Dangerous. The time of the Black Douglas. 

II. — ENGLISH Ivanhoe. The return of Richard Coeur de Lion from 

the Holy Land. 

Kenilworth. The Reign of Elizabeth. 

The Fortunes of Nigel. Reign of James I. 

Peveril of the Peak. Reign of Charles II. ; period of 
the pretended Catholic plot. 

Betrothed. The Wars of the Welch Marches. 

The Talisman. The Third Crusade ; Richard Coeur de 
Lion. 

Woodstock. The Civil War and Commonwealth. 



186 



WALTEK SCOTT 



III.— CONTI N EN 7AI Queniin Durward. Louis XI, and Charles the Bold. 

Anne of Geierstein. The epoch of the Battle of 

Nancy. 
Count Robert of Paris. The Crusaders of Byzantium. 



II.— PERSONAL, 



Guy Mannering. 

The Antiquary. 

Black Dwarf. 

Rob Roy. 

The Heart of Midlothian. 

The Bride of Lammermoor. 



The Pirate. 

St. Roma's Well. 

Redgauntlet. 

The Surgeon's Daughter. 

The Two Drovers. 

The Highland Widow. 



Suggestions for Reading. — Quentin Durward, — The Lady of 
the Lake ; — Irving's Visit to Abbotsford ; — Ward's English Poets, — 
Essay on Scott ; — Leslie Stephen's Hours in a Library, — Essay on 
Scott. 



In this chapter we have considered :■ 



1. Scott and Bums. 

2. The New Taste for Ballad Poetry, 

3. Life of Scott. 

4. His Character. 

5. His Poetry. 

6. His Novels. 



CHAPTHH XfX + 

LORD BYRON. 

(1788-1824.) 

' ' I found Lord Byron in the highest degree courteous, and even 
kind. We met for an hour or two almost daily in Mr. Murray's draw- 
ing-room, and found a great deal to say to each other. . . . His read- 
ing did not seem to me to have been very extensive, either in poetry 
or history. Having the advantage of him in that respect, and possess- 
ing a good competent share of such reading as is little read, I was 
sometimes able to put under his eye objects which had for him the 
interest of novelty." — Walter Scott. 

" Never had any writer so vast a command of the whole eloquence 
of scorn, misanthropy, and despair." — T. B. Macaulay. 

" To this day English critics are unjust to him. ... If ever there 
was a violent and madly sensitive soul, but incapable of being other- 
wise ; ever agitated, but in an enclosure without issue ; predisposed 
to poetry by its innate fire, but limited by its natural barriers to a 
single kind of poetry — it was Byron's." — H. A. Taine. 

Life of Byron. — George Gordon, Lord Byron, was born 
in London, in 1788. His father was a worthless aristocrat; 
his mother was a woman of violent temper, who by turns 
caressed and coddled her little boy, and pursued him with 
poker and tongs. She and her husband quarreled inces- 
santly, till he at last made off to the Continent with the 
remnant of her fortune that he had not already squandered. 
Byron and his mother lived together in poverty and ob- 
scurity till, at the age of eleven, he became heir to the title 
and estates of one of the most aristocratic families in En- 
gland. He inherited the noble and picturesque residence 
of Newstead Abbey, near Nottingham. Lord Byron, as 



188 • BYRON. 

the boy was now called, was sent to Harrow, and afterward 
to Trinity College, Cambridge. His school-days were much 
like the rest of his life. He was capable of "violent fits of 
work," with periods of incorrigible idleness. Though he 
was no student, he was a voracious reader. "I read eat- 
ing," he said, "read in bed; read when no one else reads." 
While at Cambridge, in his twentieth year, Byron made 
his first appearance as a poet, publishing a small volume 
called appropriately enough Hours of Idleness. The fact 
that it was written by a young peer of the realm helped to 
bring upon it the merciless ridicule of the Whigs in the 
Edinburgh Revieiv. Byron gulped down the criticism of 
his poems, and prepared to take his revenge. English 
Bards and Scotch Reviewers was not only a fierce attack 
upon his critics, but also upon nearly all the literary men 
of the day — Scott, Wordsworth, Moore, and many others, 
from whom he had received no provocation whatever. Of 
Scott he wrote : — 

" Thus Lays of Minstrels — may they be the last! — 
On half-strung harps whine mournful to the blast." 

And because Scott had sold the copyright of Marmion for 
a thousand pounds, Byron wrote : — 

' ' Let such forego the poet's sacred name, 
Who rack their brains for lucre, not for fame." 

It was to the credit of both men that they afterward be- 
came warm friends. The generous Scott said: "I have 
ever reckoned Burns and Byron the most genuine poetic 
geniuses of my time, or of half a century before me." 

Byron had no sooner finished his university studies than 
he set out on a tour of the Continent. This was in fact 
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage. When he returned to En- 
gland, he brought with him four thousand lines of poetry 



BYKON. 189 

as a souvenir of his travels in Greece, Turkey, and the 
East. This poetry was perhaps the most brilliant journal 
that a traveler has ever kept. The first two cantos of 
Childe Harold were published in 1812, when Byron was 
but twenty-four. Seven editions were exhausted in four 
weeks. "I awoke one morning/' says Byron, " and found 
myself famous." Childe Harold and its author were at the 
height of the fashion. Byron gave himself up to society 
and poetry. Childe Harold was followed in rapid succes- 
sion by The Giaour, The Bride of Abydos, The Corsair, 
and Lara. "1 wrote Lara," he says, " while undressing 
after coming home from balls and masquerades, in the 
year of revelry 1814. The Bride was written in four, The 
Corsair in ten days." Byron was a popular novelist in 
verse. His tales were sensational, often powerful. The 
freshness of his material roused the interest of the public. 
Scott had drawn his subjects from feudal and Scottish 
life ; Byron broke up new ground in describing the man- 
ners, scenery, and wild passions of the East and of Greece 
— a region as picturesque as that of his rival, and as fresh 
to his readers. 

At about this time Byron married Miss Milbanke, a lady 
of fortune. It is doubtful if any woman could have been 
a happy wife of Lord Byron ; but the austere Lady Byron 
was certainly most miserable. A year after their marriage 
she suddenly left her husband. Much of the evil reported 
of him may have been true, but enough was false to em- 
bitter him for life against British society. In 1816, at the 
age of twenty-eight, he left England, never to return. 
Thenceforth his life was passed on the Continent, in Swit- 
zerland, in Italy, and in Greece, where he solaced himself 
with bitter attacks upon all that his countrymen held most 
sacred. While at Geneva he wrote the third canto of 
Childe Harold, The Prisoner of Chillon, Manfred, and 
The Lament of Tasso. Byron's life in Italy and Switzer- 



190 BYRON. 

land was that of a wanderer. Arriving at Kavenna, he 
writes, "I may stay a day — a week — a year — all my life." 
Kavenna, Pisa, and Venice are the cities with which he is 
most closely associated. The last eight years of his life — 
the years in Italy — were marvelously productive. One 
work after another was senl? back to England, and received 
there with the keenest eagerness and excitement by de- 
lighted and scandalized readers. To this period belong 
also Mazeppa, Don Juan, The Two Foscari, Cain, and 
Werner. 

The last episode of Byron's life was the most romantic, 
and, by a happy fate, the noblest in his career. 

" Nothing in his life 
Became him like the leaving it." 

The highest sentiment of his nature was a love of liberty, 
and his noblest aspiration was for the freedom of Italy and 
of Greece, the two countries that he loved best. He had 
written long ago : — 

" The mountains look on Marathon — 

And Marathon looks on the sea ; 
And musing there an hour alone, 

I dreamed that Greece might still be free, 
For standing on the Persian's grave, 
I could not deem myself a slave." 

In 1823 he determined to devote his fortune and his in- 
fluence to the aid of the Greeks, then struggling for their 
independence. All the finest qualities of the man came to 
the front: his splendid physical courage, his firmness and 
daring. In filling his heart and soul with a noble cause, 
and in giving all his energy to its active service, Byron 
seemed to be entering upon a new life. 

Byron died of malarial fever, at Mesolonghi, at the age of 
thirty-six. 



BYRON. 191 

Childe Harold. — Those who had jeered at Hours of Idle- 
ness, recognized in Childe Harold the arrival of an un- 
mistakable poet.. The book, as we have seen, had at once 
an immense popularity. Travelers find it the most fasci- 
nating guide-book ever written, while lovers of poetry de- 
light in its beauty and sentiment. The hero, Childe Har- 
old, is Byron himself. His interest is divided between the 
lovely and the historic scenes of his travels and the con- 
templation of his own unhappy mind. He is always 
gloomy and always poetical. The first canto describes 
Portugal and Spain ; the second carries the wanderer to 
Greece and the iEgean Archipelago ; in the third and 
finest, Switzerland, Belgium, and the Bhine give opportu- 
nity not only for exquisite passages of description, but for 
musings upon Napoleon, Voltaire, Bousseau, and other 
great men, whose renown has thrown new glory over en- 
chanting scenes ; in the fourth canto the reader is borne 
over the fairest part of Italy — Venice, Ferrara, Florence, 
Borne, and Bavenna. The immortal dead of Italy, and 
her masterpieces of painting and sculpture, are described 
with a passionate feeling that had never before been shown 
in descriptive poetry. The third and fourth cantos were 
written several years later than the first two, and show the 
increasing power of Byron as he grew older. A nobler in- 
spiration is to be found in the latter half of Childe Harold 
than anywhere else in his poetry. (P. 362.) 

Metrical Romances. — The great mass of Byron's earlier 
work consists of tales in verse. Scott's narrative poems 
were then delighting the world, and Byron, borrowing his 
free and easy metres, set about writing a series of Oriental 
romances. But he had not the story-telling gift of Scott. 
He was absorbed in the passions and woes of the gloomy, 
mysterious, and cynical hero who appears in all his poems, 
and who was no other than the self-conscious poet himself. 



192 BYEON. 

Byron created but two characters — a man contemptuous of 
other men, skeptical, and despairing, yet with moments of 
kindly, generous feeling ; and a woman devoted and loving, 
but loving with unreasoning affection. Throughout these 
poems we meet with animated and beautiful description. 
The following lines begin the tale of Parisina : — 

" It is the hour when from the boughs 
The nightingale's high note is heard; 

It is the hour when lovers' vows 
Seem sweet in every whisper'd word ; 

And gentle winds, and waters near, 

Make music to the lonely ear. 

Each flower the dews have lightly wet, 

And in the sky the stars are met, 

And on the wave is deeper blue, 

And on the leaf a browner hue, 

And in the heaven that clear obscure, 

So softly dark, and darkly pure, 

Which follows the decline of day, 

As twilight melts beneath the moon away." 

Of Byron's tales in verse, the short poems of The Prisoner 
of Chillon and Mazeppa are the most natural and beautiful. 

Don Juan is the longest and the most characteristic, the 
most witty, brilliant, and lawless of Byron's poems. Its 
purpose was not so much to tell a story as to supply an out- 
let for Byron's experiences and opinions of the world and 
society. It was in this poem that he made his most savage 
attack on English society. Don Juan, flippant as it is, 
contains profound and melancholy satire. Its blasphemy 
and indecency banish it from the higher ranks of poetry. 
It is to the credit of the moral sense of English readers 
that only works sound at the core are allowed to become 
the classics of our literature. 

Byron's Dramatic Works. — Byron's most ambitious poetry 
was in dramatic form ; but his self-consciousness made his 



BYRON. 193 

success as a dramatist impossible. In his narrative poems, 
he never could forget himself ; nor could he in his plays. 
They are hardly more than monologues spoken by Lord 
Byron. In Cain and in Manfred, his two finest dramas, 
he sets before us with great power the struggles that rend 
his own soul. The scene of Manfred is among the Alps, 
in the presence of the Jungfrau. Byron had a natural 
affinity with the sublime. He loved the mountains and 
the ocean, but even with them he never forgot himself. 
They filled him with tumultuous feeling, but it was because 
he found himself and his own moods reflected everywhere. 
In a dark and lonely mountain peak he saw the symbol of 
his own life ; and the ocean, 

" boundless, endless, and sublime, 



The image of eternity, the throne 
Of the invisible," 

was dear to Byron, because he felt himself its child. Yet 
some of his best moments were spent in communion with 
Nature, as some of his best poetry describes her various 
aspects. 

General Characteristics of Byron's Poetry. — The marvel- 
ous rapidity with which he wrote was proof of Byron's 
energy and power. The verses flow easily, simpty, and nat- 
urally; they are never involved or obscure. The fluency 
of his verse led, however, to his greatest faults. He is 
often diffuse and poor in thought and imagination. This is 
not the poetry that we read, reread, and return to again. 
Byron never rewrote a poem. He said, "I am like the 
tiger. If I miss the first spring, I go grumbling back to 
my jungle again ; but if I do it, it is crushing.-" 

It was a characteristic principle in all Byron's conduct 
that he would never "try again" ; and only by trying 
again is literary work made evenly good. Byron's poetry 



194 B Y K 1ST . 

is always uneven. He is full of brilliant passages ; and, 
in saying this of a poet, we are making an apology for 
him. It implies that he cannot give completeness to his 
work, that he cannot or will not round out and make per- 
fect every part. 

Foreign Appreciation of Byron. — Whatever may be the 
final value that his own countrymen set upon Byron, the 
fact remains that in the eyes of foreigners he is the English 
poet next in rank to Shakespeare. Goethe's admiration 
for him was unbounded. He calls Byron " the represent- 
ative of the modern poetic era" — "undoubtedly to be 
regarded as the greatest genius of our century." Taine 
says of him : — 

" He is so great and so English that from him alone we shall learn 
more truths of his country and of his age than from all the rest put 
together. His ideas were proscribed during his life ; it has been at- 
tempted to depreciate his genius since his death. Even at the pres- 
ent day, English critics are hardly just to him. A foreign critic may 
be more impartial, and freely praise the powerful hand whose blows 
he has not felt." 

Contemporary Poets. — In a distant view of our own age, 
the first half of the nineteenth century will probably be* 
held famous for its poetry, and the second half for its prose. 

(1.) Thomas Moore, the friend and biographer of Byron, 
was an Irishman, and in his Irish Melodies his best poetry 
is to be found. He composed these lyrics, as Burns had 
written his Scotch songs, in order to furnish appropriate 
words to old national airs. 9 Tis the Last Rose of Summer, 
and Oft in the Stilly Night are well-known songs of Moore. 
His long narrative poem, Lalla Rookh, was much admired 
in its day. (2.) A far greater poet was Percy Bysshe Shel- 
ley. No more highly imaginative nature is to be met in 
all English literature. The most characteristic faults and 



BYRON. 195 

beauties of a poet's mind and character were united in 
Shelley. He dwelt in a world vast, distant, and unreal, 
and his poetry is mysterious and ethereal. The lyric drama 
of Prometheus Unbound is his most splendid work. The 
Cloud, To a Skylark, and Ode to the West Wind, show 
his exquisite gift as a lyric poet. Shelley died in his 
thirtieth year ; Keats died at the age of twenty-five. 
Both men were of remarkable promise, and, had they 
lived, might have been among the first of English poets. 
(3.) Keats loved beauty passionately, and filled his poetry 
with all that was rich and rare. His subjects, his pictures,, 
his very words, are beautiful and luxuriant. In his short 
life he wrote several poems that are worthy to live, among 
them Endymion, Hyperion, Lamia, and TJie Eve of St. 
Agnes. (4.) Thomas Hood was a poet of a distinctly dif- 
ferent type. Humor and pathos were his gifts, rather than 
imagination. The Bridge of Sighs and the Song of the 
Shirt show his peculiar powers, and the earnestness and 
tenderness of his heart. (5.) Elizabeth Barrett Brown- 
ing has been the most eminent poet among women. She 
had many of the qualities of the poet : thought, passion, 
and imagination. Her writing, however, was uneven and 
ill-controlled. Aurora Leigh is her most characteristic 
work. (6.) Thomas Campbell was the author of Pleasures 
of Hope, and of several noble lyrics. Hohenlinden, Ye 
Mariners of England, and the Battle of the Baltic are 
stirring poems of war. (7.) As poets, Leigh Hunt and 
Walter Savage Landor stand between the age of Scott and 
Byron and the age of Tennyson and Browning. Hunt's 
poetry is graceful, sprightly, and full of fancy. His most 
important writings, however, were his prose contributions 
to periodicals. (8. ) Landor's best poetry is found in his 
Hellenics, or imitations of Greek thought and style. His 
most valuable writing was, like Leigh Hunt's, in prose 
form. Landor's Imaginary Conversations of Literary 



196 BYRON. 

Men and Statesmen give him his place in English litera- 
ture. 

Suggestions for Reading. — Selected Poems of Byron, edited 
by Matthew Arnold ; Preface by Matthew Arnold ; — Ward's English 
Poets, — Essay on Byron; — Whipple's Essays and Reviews,— Essay 
on Byron. 



In this chapter we have considered: 

1. The Life of Byron, 

2. CMlde Harold. 

3. Byron's Metrical Romances. 

4. His Dramatic Works. 

5. General Characteristics of his Poetry, 

6. Foreign Appreciation of Byron. 

7. Contemporary Poets. 



i 



CHAPTHH XX. 

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. 

(1770-1850.) 

" I do not know a man more to be venerated for uprightness of 
heart and loftiness of genius." — Walter Scott. 

" To feel for the first time # a communion with his mind, is to dis- 
cover loftier faculties in our own." — Thomas N. Talfourd. 

"Whatever the world may think of me or of my poetry is now of 
little consequence ; but one thing is a comfort of my old age, that 
none of my works written since the days of my early youth, contains 
a line which I should wish to blot out because it panders to the baser 
passions of our nature. This is a comfort to me ; I can do no mischief 
by my works when I am gone." — William Wordsworth. 

" Wordsworth's poetry is great because of the extraordinary power 
with which Wordsworth feels the joy offered to us in nature, the joy 
offered to us in the simple primary affections and duties ; and be- 
cause of the extraordinary power with which, in case after case, he 
shows us this joy, and renders it so as to make us share it." — Matthew 
Arnold. 

The Lake Poets. — The so-called "Lake Poets" were Cole- 
ridge, Sou they, and Wordsworth, three friends and neigh- 
bors in the English Lake country. The name "Lake 
School " was first flung contemptuously at them by the 
critics, and has since clung to them in more serious earnest 
than was intended. The three men were congenial com- 
panions, but their poetry has but few qualities in common. 
(1.) TJie Ancient Mariner of Coleridge holds a unique 
place in English poetry. It is a poem perfect of its kind. 
For power of imagination, picturesqueness, and music it is 



198 WORDSWORTH. 

unsurpassed. Coleridge wrote much in proseupon critical 
and philosophical subjects. (2. ) Southey composed several 
long narrative poems and many short pieces. His poetry 
was respectable, but not of lasting beauty or power. 
Southey was a useful and sensible, often a delightful 
writer of prose. His Life of Nelson has become a classic. 

Other Friends of Wordsworth were Hazlitt, Lamb, and 
De Quincey. (1.) Hazlitt was one of the first professional 
critics. He possessed a fine taste and picturesque style, 
and was a popular lecturer and magazine contributor in 
the early part of this century. (2.) The Essays of Mia 
were written by Charles Lamb, an exquisite humorist, and 
a lovable man. These short, unpretending essays are rich 
in wit and wisdom, and filled with dainty and piquant 
felicities of expression. Their unconventional style has all 
the personal charm of the writer. (3.) Thomas De Quin- 
cey was a critic of rare delicacy, and a masterly writer of 
English prose. The best known of his writings, The Con- 
fessions of an Opium-eater, is remarkable for the fearful 
picturesqueness of its descriptions and for the beauty of 
its style. 

The Life of Wordsworth was singularly uneventful. He 
was born and reared in Cumberland, the Lake Country of 
England, and there he spent the greater part of his life. 
To the traveler it is still "Wordsworth's country"; every 
lake and stream and mountain is more beautiful because 
of his poetry. 

Wordsworth was sent, when a lad of nine, to a school at 
Hawkshead, in the most picturesque district of Lancashire. 
His school-days were divided between his love of books and 
his love of out-door life. His career at the university was 
creditable, but not brilliant. After taking his degree at 
Cambridge, in 1791, he went to France, and threw himself 



WOEDSWOETH. 199 

with all his youthful enthusiasm into the cause of the 
French revolutionists. When the fierce struggle for liberty 
in France had ended in the despotism of JSTapoleon, Words- 
worth, after a season of bitter disappointment and despond- 
ency, returned to his English conservatism, and remained 
to the end of his days a sober, old-fashioned Tory. Words- 
worth was poor. None of the learned professions tempted 
him, and he had no inclination for an active business life. 
His desire was to be a poet ; he describes in the Prelude 
his solemn consecration of himself to poetry: — 

' ' Ah ! need I say, dear Friend, that to the brim 
My heart was full : I made no vows, but vows 
Were then made for me ; bond unknown to me 
Was given, that I should be, else sinning greatly, 
A dedicated Spirit." 

When he was twenty-five, he was made free to follow his 
inclination. His friend Raisley Calvert died, and, with a 
loyal faith in Wordsworth, left him a legacy of £900, and 
besought him to devote his life to poetry. For a few years 
he lived in the south of England, with his sister. Cole- 
ridge was his neighbor, and became his intimate friend. In 
their long walks together, they talked of a tour in Ger- 
many, and discussed the possibility of raising funds for the 
journey. The two friends agreed to publish together a 
little volume of poems, which they called Lyrical Ballads. 
Coleridge's share of the oook was Tlie Ancient Mariner. 
Of the poems that Wordsworth contributed, some were 
among the best, some were among the worst that he ever 
wrote. The critics were savage in their attack upon the 
little volume. The reviews rang with merriment over the 
absurdities of both poets ; yet this volume contained not 
only Tlie Ancient Mariner, but the Lines Written Above 
Tintern Abbey, one of the most characteristic and beauti- 
ful of Wordsworth's poems. After a few months in G-er- 



200 WORDSWORTH. 

many, lie returned to England, and, just at the close of 
the last century, took up his abode again in the Lake 
Country. Wordsworth was blessed with the love and com- 
panionship of two noble women, — his wife and his sister. 
His beautiful tribute to his wife is one of the best known 
among his poems : — 

" A creature not too bright or good 
For human nature's daily food ; 
For transient sorrows, simple wiles, 
Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles. 

****** 
The reason firm, the temperate will, 
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill; 
A perfect woman, nobly planned, 
To warn, to comfort, and command ; 
And yet a spirit still, and bright 
With something of an angel light." 

Wordsworth's sister Dorothy was herself almost a poet. 
She had, like her brother, a sensitive delight in Nature, 
and a vigorous imagination ; but the poetry that was in 
her found its only expression in her brother's verse. In 
notes from her diary may be found the germs of some of 
his most exquisite poems. 

In 1813 the family left Grasmere for Eydal Mount, the 
home now most closely associated with the memory of 
Wordsworth. Their life was simple and frugal, following 
closely the poet's own text, " plain living and high think- 
ing." Meanwhile, undismayed by the ill-luck of his Lyr- 
ical Ballads, he issued a new volume of poems, which met 
with the same fate. Fortunately, he was not dependent 
on the earnings of his pen, for, in addition to the legacy 
of Calvert, Wordsworth had been paid a debt of £8,500, 
due to his father at the time of his death. From year to 
year he sent his poems into the world, regardless of money 
or fame. He told a friend that for years his poetry did 



WORDSWORTH. 201 

not bring him in enough to buy his shoe-strings ! But at 
last the tide turned. Gradually the lovers of Wordsworth 
increased, till, in the years between 1830 and 1840, his 
hard-won fame culminated. Byron and Scott were gone ; 
till Tennyson appeared, Wordsworth was the foremost poet 
of England. Public honors were heaped upon him. The 
universities gave him their honorary degrees. He received 
a government pension, and, in 1843, was made Poet Lau- 
reate. He died April 23, 1850, at the age of eighty. 

Wordsworth's Theory of Poetic Diction. — Wordsworth's 
place in the history of English poetry is of great interest 
and importance. To understand what he accomplished, 
we must recall the characteristics of the eighteenth cent- 
ury poets. They had cared more for Art than for Nature, 
for the town than for the country, for high life than for 
low life ; and they had, as we have seen, established a 
separate language for poetry, which they chose to regard 
as something quite apart from every-day life. In the lat- 
ter part of the century, however, Cowper had ventured to 
write in simple, homely language, and Burns had boldly 
used his hearty Scotch dialect. The change from the 
style of Pope had already begun when Wordsworth ap- 
peared, but it found in him its strongest supporter. He 
attacked the old poetic diction, and maintained that the 
true and literal word is always dignified, and suitable alike 
for poetry or prose. Wordsworth was partly right and 
partly wrong : he was entirely right in rejecting stilted and 
artificial language, but he was wrong in putting into its 
place the diction of prose. The words used in poetry and 
prose should be different, because they are employed to 
express two different states of mind. The language of 
excitement and exaltation is ridiculous in dealing with 
plain facts ; while the language of calm, every-day prose, 
is equally absurd when used* for the expression of elevated 



202 WORDSWORTH. 

feeling. The very rhythm of poetry is intended to con- 
vey emotion, and this emotion requires a form of expres- 
sion raised above ordinary speech. It demands simple, 
but not homely language, — a distinction that Wordsworth 
did not clearly make. He fell often into the absurd and 
the grotesque, in his attempt to use homely subjects and 
homely language. Fortunately, he did not always carry 
out his theory. If he had used only a peasant's vocabu- 
lary, he could not have written the Ode on 'Immortality. 
A few lines of his finest poetry show that his practice was 
wiser than his teaching. In the following verses he is 
describing the effects of the pealing organ in King's Col- 
lege Chapel, with its " self -poised roof, scooped into ten 
thousand cells" : — 

' ' But from the arms of silence — list ! list — 
The music bursteth into second life ; 
The notes luxuriate, every stone is kissed 
With sound, or ghost of sound, in mazy strife ! " 

Wordsworth and his Fellow-men. — Wordsworth's pecu- 
liar use of language awakens the interest of the reader. 
His attention will next be drawn to the two subjects 
that fill Wordsworth's poetry, — Nature and Man. He 
honored Man, and bent "in reverence," he says, 

" To Nature, and the power of human minds, 
To men as they are men within themselves. 
How oft high service is performed within, 
When all the external man is rude in show, — 
Not like a temple rich with pomp and gold, 
But a mere mountain chapel, that protects 
Its simple worshipers from sun and shower. 
Of these, said I, shall be my song ; of these, 
If future years mature me for the task, 
Will I record the praises, making verse 
Deal boldly with substantial things. 



WORDSWORTH. 203 

Nature for all conditions wants not power 
To consecrate, if we have eyes to see, 
The outside of her creatures, and to breathe 
Grandeur upon the very humblest face 
Of human life." 

Wordsworth's poetry was filled with the same spirit that 
had kindled Burns : — 

" For a' that, and a' that, 
Our toils obscure, and a' that ; 
The man's the gowd for a' that." 

Says Stopford Brooke : — 

' ' He was the first who threw around the lives of homely men and 
women the glory and sweetness of song, and taught us to know the 
brotherhood of all men in a more beautiful way than the wild way 
of the Revolution." 

Wordsworth's doctrine that "the whole range of the 
beautiful, the pathetic, the tragic, the heroic, was to be 
found in common, lowly life," was new to the world when 
he taught it. Since his day, our greatest novelists have 
made it familiar, till the interest in poor and humble men 
and women has become one of the most marked charac- 
teristics of the poetry and fiction of the nineteenth cent- 
ury.' It was in this spirit that George Eliot wrote of the 
" sad fortunes of Amos Barton/' or Wordsworth told the 
humble tragedy of Michael. 

Wordsworth was a true poet in his attitude toward 
children. The mind of a child was to him the most 
sacred and beautiful thing that he beheld. It kindled his 
imagination, and inspired in him the fanciful but beauti- 
ful belief that 

" Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: 
The soul that riseth with us, our life's Star, 
Hath had elsewhere its setting, 
And cometh from afar : 



204 WORDSWORTH. 

Not in entire forget fulness, 
And not in utter nakedness, 
But trailing clouds of glory do we come 

From God, who is our home : 
Heaven lies about us in our infancy ! 
Shades of the prison-house begin to close 

Upon the growing Boy, 
But He beholds the light, and whence it flows 

He sees it in his joy ; 
The Youth, who daily farther from the East 

Must travel, still is Nature's priest, 

And by the vision splendid 

Is on his way attended ; 
At length the Man perceives it die away, 
And fade into the light of common day." 

Wordsworth, and Nature. — Wordsworth loved humble 
men and children, because he loved everything as Nature 
had made it. His feeling toward Nature was new in his 
time. No poet had lived to whom she was so near and 
dear and human. He turned to her for comfort, inspira- 
tion, and revelation. What Nature was to Wordsworth he 
himself tells best in the beautiful lines written near Tin- 
tern Abbey. Alone with hills and streams, he said : 

" I have felt 
A presence that disturbs me with the joy 
Of elevated thoughts : a sense sublime 
Of something far more deeply interfused, 
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, 
And the round ocean and the living air, 
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man: 
A motion and a spirit, that impels 
All thinking things, all objects of all thought, 
And rolls through all things." 

Wordsworth is " well pleased to recognize in Nature" 

" The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, 
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul 
Of all my moral being." 



WORDSWORTH. 205 

" Nature never did betray 
The heart that loved her ; 'tis her privilege, 
Through all the years of this our life, to lead 
. From joy to joy: for she can so inform 
The mind that is within us, so impress 
With quietness and beauty, and so feed 
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues, 
Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men, 
Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all 
The dreary intercourse of daily life, 
Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb 
Our cheerful faith, that all which we behold 
Is full of blessings." 

This was Wordsworth's belief and his teaching. A beau- 
tiful simile that he once used expresses his own attitude 
toward the universe. Every child has held a shell to his 
ear, and listened to the sound of the sea. Who but Words- 
worth would have turned the simple incident to a meaning 
so beautiful as this ? The child presses the shell to his 
ear, — 



To which, in silence hushed, his very soul 
Listened intensely, and his countenance soon 
Brightened with joy; for, murmuring from within, 
Were heard sonorous cadences, whereby 
To his belief the monitor expressed 
Mysterious union with its native sea. 
Even such a shell the universe itself 
Is to the ear of Faith." 



Wordsworth was not only a poet ; he was a teacher. 
By the study of what he wrote we may learn how to live 
more wisely, happily, and nobly. His poetry has fulfilled 
his ambition : " to console the afflicted ; to add sunshine 
to daylight by making* the happy happier ; to teach the 
young and the gracious of every age to see, to think, and 
to feel." 



206 WORDSWORTH. 

Suggestions for Reading.— We are Seven, The Leech-Gatherer, 
I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud, She was a Phantom of Delight, 
Ode on Intimations of Immortality, Lines Written Near Tintern 
Abbey, Fragment from The Recluse, Sonnets 8, 19, 23, 24, 25, 27, 29, 
39, 40, — from selected Poems of Wordsworth, edited by Matthew Ar- 
nold ; Preface by Matthew Arnold ; — Lowell's Essay on Wordsworth. 



In this chapter we have considered :- 

1. The Lake Poets, 

2. Other Friends of Wordsworth, 

3. Tlie IAfe of Wordsworth. 

4. His Theory of Poetic Diction. 

5. Wordsworth and His Fellotv-meti. 

6. Wordsworth and Nature. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY. 

(1800-1859.) 

" INfecaulay's style, like other original things, has already produced 
a school of imitators. Its influence may be distinctly traced both in 
the periodical and daily literature of the day. Its great character- 
istic is the shortness of the sentences and the rapidity with which 
new and distinct ideas or facts succeed each other in his richly-stored 
pages." 

" Few authors have written more eloquently of freedom, or paid 
truer and nobler homage to its advocates and martyrs ; and few have 
opened hotter vials of wrath upon bigotry, tyranny, and all forms of 
legislative fraud." — Whipple. 

Historical Writing in the Nineteenth Century. — The 

Victorian Age has seen an extraordinary development in 
two departments of prose writing : in fiction and in his- 
tory. Historians have adopted new and more scholarly 
methods in the preparation of their material. Eelying 
largely on the testimony of contemporary witnesses, they 
spare themselves no labor in deciphering old letters, mem- 
oirs, and other private papers, and they are indefatigable 
in their study of the innumerable public documents re- 
cently opened to scholars. The historian of the nine- 
teenth century possesses also rare skill in the handling of 
his material. He has the imagination that enables him to 
think and feel as men thought and felt centuries ago. He 
is thus able to reproduce the past ; while with his critical 
insight he traces the relations of events, and pronounces a 
wise judgment upon men and things. To his scholarship 
and historical sense, he adds the charm of a well-developed 
prose style ; till, at the present day, the most absorbing 



208 MACAULAY. 

narratives, the most finished studies of character, the most 
brilliant and picturesque descriptions, are to be found in 
the pages of the historian. Carlyle's History of the French 
Revolution is a work remarkable for its scholarship, imagi- 
nation, and style. Hallam's Middle Ages, Milman's Latin 
Christianity, and Grote's History of Greece, are among 
the ablest of modern works. Many eminent historians of 
our century are still living, and therefore do not come 
within the scope of this text-book. Of those who are 
gone, the most versatile and popular, and the one most 
inviting to the young reader, is Thomas Babington Ma- 
caulay. 

Life of Macaulay. — He was born in England, but was of 
Scotch descent. His father, Zachary Macaulay, was a 
philanthropist, who spent his life in laboring for the aboli- 
tion of slavery in the English Colonies. Like his son, he 
was a man of vast information and remarkable memory. 
When his friend Wilberforce was at a loss for a fact, he 
used to say, " Let us look it out in Macaulay!" 

Macaulay's boyhood was, perhaps, the period of his 
greatest literary activity. Said Miss Hannah More, the 
little boy's friend and confidante, "The quantity of read- 
ing Tom has poured in, and the quantity of writing he has 
poured out, is astonishing." He wrote a compendium of 
universal history ; a paper intended to persuade the hea- 
then to embrace the Christian religion ; and a poem in six 
cantos, called TJie Battle of Cheviot — the result of his boy- 
ish enthusiasm for Scott. He was hardly more than eight 
when he composed an epic poem. 

Macaulay' s school-days were passed at an excellent pri- 
vate school near Cambridge, and his education was con- 
tinued at the university. It was in these years that he was 
laying the foundations of his vast learning. " The secret 
of his immense acquirements," says his biographer, Trevel- 



MACAULAT. 209 

yan, " lay in two invaluable gifts of nature : an unerring 
memory, and the capacity for taking in at a glance the 
contents of a printed page." 

Macaulay, like many other men of letters, began life as 
a lawyer ; but he soon found that literature was the pursuit 
in which he was happiest. At the age of twenty-five, he 
published his essay on Milton, and, like Byron, " awoke one 
morning and found himself famous." The essay was pub- 
lished in The Edinburgh Review, and marked the begin- 
ning of Macaulay's connection with that periodical. He 
remained for twenty years its most brilliant contributor ; 
in its pages first appeared nearly all those papers now 
known as Macaulay's Essays. After the first burst of ad- 
miration for the essay on Milton, a cooler judgment found 
much in it to criticise. It is but justice to Macaulay, how- 
ever, to remember that he was only twenty-five when he 
wrote it, and that years after, he declared that it hardly con- 
tained a paragraph which his matured judgment approved. 

This single magazine article made Macaulay a literary 
lion. He was for many years a brilliant figure in London 
society. " Macaulay is the king of diners-out/' writes 
Emerson. " I do not know when I have seen such won- 
derful vivacity. He has the strength of ten men, immense 
memory, fun, fire, learning, politics, manners, and pride, 
and talks all the time in a steady torrent." 

" Macaulay improves, Macaulay improves ! " cried Syd- 
ney Smith. "I have observed in him of late flashes of — 
silence ! " 

At the age of thirty, Macaulay entered Parliament. The 
gift that gave him influence in the House of Commons was 
closely akin to his gift as a writer : his speeches were like 
his essays, vigorous, emphatic, full of the same splendor of 
illustration and intensity of feeling. Macaulay's life for 
several years was made up of Parliamentary debates, fre- 
quent contributions to The Edinburgh Review, and a sue- 



210 MACAULAY. 

cession of dinner-parties. In 1834, he became a member 
of the Supreme Council of India. In the four years of his 
residence in India he did little literary work. He had 
regarded literature as a relaxation, never as a means of 
support. " The thought of becoming a bookseller's hack/' 
he says, " of writing to relieve, not the fullness of the 
mind, but the emptiness of the pocket ; of filling sheets 
with trash merely that the sheets may be filled, — is horri- 
ble to me. Yet thus it must be, if I quit office." He re- 
turned from India in 1838, filled with a strong purpose : 
"to write the history of England from the accession of 
King James II. down to a time within the memory of men 
still living." It was a loss to literature that Macaulay was 
immediately forced back into politics. When he died, at 
the age of fifty-nine, his great work had not been com- 
pleted, — was, indeed, but a fragment of the history that 
Macaulay intended to write. 

Macaulay' s Poetry. — Macaulay had great facility in the 
use of rhyme and rhythm. His ballads are smooth, spir- 
ited, and stirring. Macaulay says frankly that he imitates 
Scott, "the great restorer of our ballad poetry"; but the 
Lays of Ancient Rome are far below Scott in picturesque- 
ness and true poetic interest. The Battle of Lake Regillus 
and Horatius produce a fine effect on the ear, but beyond 
that, yield little satisfaction to the mature reader. 

Macaulay' s Essays cover a wide range of topics ; but the 
larger number, and the most important, relate to English 
history or to English literature. Subjects like Lord 
Bacon, Warren Hastings, Addison, are not inviting to 
the mass of readers, till, touched with Macaulay's pen, 
they become fascinating and delightful. 

" The traveler in Australia, visiting one settler's hut after another, 
finds again and again that the settler's third book, after the Bible 
and Shakespeare, is some work by Macaulay. Nothing can be more 



MACAULAY. 211 

natural. The Bible and Shakespeare may be said to be imposed upon 
an Englishman as objects of his admiration ; but as soon as the com- 
mon Englishman, desiring culture, begins to choose for himself, he 
chooses Macaulay." 

These words of Matthew Arnold indicate the peculiar 
value of Macaulay to the English-speaking race. His 
mission is to those just entering upon the intellectual life. 
He invites to knowledge ; he tempts to learning. He 
proves to the young that the things of the mind are not 
dry and dull, but rich and alluring. Information that 
would otherwise have reached the reader in some laborious, 
circuitous fashion, comes through Macaulay straight to the 
comprehension. Knowledge thus filtered grows at once 
clear and practical. He took learning out of musty books 
and away from pedantic instructors, and transformed it 
into the popular reading of the day. " He popularized 
learning," some one says sneeringly ; but the writer who 
brings intellectual life to the sheep ranch of Australia or 
Texas, is worthy of more gratitude than contempt. 

The most serious charge against Macaulay is that he 
sacrificed truth in making his statements always striking 
and attractive, and in indulging his strong personal prej- 
udices. Every thoughtful reader must acknowledge that 
this is in a degree true. Macaulay loved a short, emphatic 
statement, without doubt or qualification. Lord Melbourne 
used to say that he wished he were as sure of anything as 
Tom Macaulay was of everything. There is in his writing 
a manly, vigorous quality that does at times become loud- 
voiced and overbearing. " Macaulay is rough," says Taine ; 
"when he strikes, he knocks down." But after making 
all allowances for the strength of his prejudices and for his 
over-emphatic rhetoric, there remains enough of reliable 
matter in Macaulay to send us to his writings for vast and 
varied instruction. His very excess of force is that which 
arrests the attention of the inexperienced reader, and rouses 



212 MACAULAY. 

his interest in a hitherto unattractive subject. Macaulay 
is simple, concrete, and picturesque, never too high or too 
deep for the average reader. He had that power of selection 
that seizes at a glance upon what is striking ; and he pos- 
sessed the further gift of making a subject tenfold more 
striking by the language in which he clothed it. (P. 382.) 

History of England. ---The first two volumes of Macau- 
lay's history appeared in 1848 ; and since Gibbon's Decline 
and Fall of the Roman Empire, no historical work had 
been received with such excitement. In less than four 
months, thirteen thousand copies had been sold. In the 
United States it had a popularity like that of the novels of 
Dickens. Macaulay wrote in 1841, " I shall not be satis- 
fied unless I produce something which shall for a few days 
supersede the last fashionable novel on the tables of young 
ladies." Trevelyan adds, "The annual sale of the 'his- 
tory' has frequently since 1857 surpassed the sale of the 
fashionable novel of the current year." Macaulay's His- 
tory of England is a thoroughly interesting work. It is 
prejudiced, dogmatic, diffuse, and unphilosophical, say the 
critics. The readers, on the other hand, persist in finding 
it the most attractive history of England thus far written. 
It has all the charm and all the faults of the essays. 

Style. — Macaulay's famous style has been well described 
by Dean Milman : — 

' ' Its characteristics were vigor and animation, copiousness, clear- 
ness ; above all, sound English, now a rare excellence. The vigor 
and life were unabating ; perhaps in that conscious strength which 
cost no exertion, he did not always gauge and measure the force of 

his own words His copiousness had nothing tumid, diffuse, 

Asiatic ; no ornament for the sake of ornament. As to its clearness, 
one may read a sentence of Macaulay twice to judge of its full force, 
never to comprehend its meaning. His English was pure, both in 
idiom and in words, pure to fastidiousness ; . . . . every word must 



MACAtTLAY. 213 

be genuine English, nothing that approached real vulgarity, nothing 
that had not the stamp of popular use, or the authority of sound En- 
glish writers, nothing unfamiliar to the common ear." 

If rhetoric is the art of effective expression, then Macau - 
lay is our greatest rhetorician. His style is intensely prac- 
tical. His effort is to fix a thought in the mind of a reader 
with the same force with which it leaves his own, and every 
artifice of rhetoric is made use of to produce this result. 
His mannerisms are nearly all tricks of oratory ; short sen- 
tences, omission of connectives, enumeration of details in a 
series, and constant use of antithesis. 

Trevelyan describes the care with which Macaulay 
wrote : — 

" The main secret of Macaulay's success lay in this, that to extraor- 
dinary fluency and facility he united patient, minute, and persistent 
diligence. He well knew, as Chaucer knew before him, that 

' There is no workeman 
That can bothe worken wel and hastilie. 
This must be done at leisure parfaitlie.' 

" If his method of composition ever comes into fashion, books 

probably will be better, and undoubtedly will be shorter 

Macaulay never allowed a sentence to pass muster until it was as 
good as he could make it. He thought little of recasting a whole 
chapter in order to obtain a more lucid arrangement, and nothing 
whatever of reconstructing a paragraph for the sake of one happy 

stroke or apt illustration Macaulay deserved the compliment 

which Cecil paid to Sir Walter Raleigh as the supreme of commenda- 
tions : ' I know that he can labor terribly.' " 

Suggestions for Reading. — Essay on Mme. D'ArUay, and Essay 
on Warren Hastings ; — Whipple's Essay on Macaulay. 



In this chapter we have considered: — 

1, Historical Writing in the Nineteenth Century, 

2, The Life of Macaulay, 

3, Poetry, 5, History of England, 

4, Essays, 6, Style. 



CHAPTHH XXU* 

THE NOVELISTS. 

Minor Novelists. — The novel of real life, as Fielding 
wrote it, gave way, before many years, to the romance ; 
till, at the close of the last century, the most popular 
writer of fiction in England was (1.) Mrs. Ann Kadcliffe. 
Her books were filled with improbable incidents and im- 
possible people, and were written in a high-flown and sen- 
timental style. The Romance of the Forest and the Mys- 
teries of Udolpho were the fashionable novels of their day. 
They, moreover, inspired a crowd of imitators, whose 
names and whose books have now passed quite out of sight. 
(2.) It was in protest against these high-flown romances 
that Jane Austen wrote her first novel, — Northanger Abbey. 
She was a humorist and a literary artist of a high order. 
Her novels keep strictly within the bounds of possibility 
and common sense ; but, under her delicate touch, famil- 
iar incidents and conventional people become original and 
delightful. Pride and Prejudice, Emma, and Mansfield 
Park are her best works. (3.) Of Maria Edgeworth, too, 
it was said that her novels were "a sort of essence of com- 
mon sense." Her stories of Irish life were full of vivacity, 
humor, and pathos. Castle Rachrent is one of the best. 
Scott used to say that Miss Edgeworth's Irish tales had 
first inspired him to write his Scottish romances. Both 
Miss Austen and Miss Edgeworth had a warm admirer in 
the generous Sir Walter. He never tired of praising Jane 
Austen's exquisite skill in making commonplace things in- 
teresting. He was himself a far greater force in fiction 
than any writer who had preceded him. He made En- 



THE NOVELISTS. 215 

gland a nation of novel-readers. He created a new outlet 
for literary energy, and inspired young writers with a new 
ambition. .The novel has reached, an extraordinary devel- 
opment since his day. Much tolerably good fiction has been 
written, much more that is intolerably poor ; while a few 
novels have risen to the highest ranks of literature. 

(4.) Among the novelists whose fame promises to be 
lasting, is Charlotte Bronte, the author of Jane Eyre, 
Shirley, and Villette. She was a writer of singular power 
and originality. She searched the human heart for its 
deepest experiences, and depicted with marvelous intensity 
its joys and sufferings. Her style was strong, abrupt, often 
crude, but impassioned and poetical. (5.) Charles Reade's 
novels are marked by fiery energy, both of style and pur- 
pose. They are read for their breathless succession of in- 
cidents and dramatic scenes rather than for their rounded 
studies of character. In his earnest desire to be useful to 
his public, Charles Reade made each of his novels attack 
some abuse of the times, — the prison system, the misman- 
agement of hospitals, or the tyranny of trades unions. 
His masterpiece is Th,e Cloister and the Hearth. With all 
his dramatic gifts and his skill as a narrator, Charles 
Reacle often offends the taste by coarseness of style and 
feeling. (6.) Anthony Trollope's novels are not the prod- 
uct of creative genius, but rather of keen, humorous ob- 
servation, thorough knowledge of the world, genial, kindly 
sympathies, and the unerring instincts of a gentleman. 
English fiction offers no more delicate entertainment than 
maybe found in the so-called "clerical novels" of An- 
thony Trollope, beginning with The Warden, and ending 
with TJie Last Chronicle of Bar set. (7.) Sir Edward Bul- 
wer Lytton won a highly respectable position as novelist 
and dramatist. Richelieu and The Lady of Lyons are 
well known on the stage ; The Last Days of Pompeii, 
Eienzi, and TJte Caxtons are standard novels. 



216 THE NOVELISTS. 

The three names most significant in the history of nine- 
teenth century fiction are Dickens, Thackeray, and George 
Eliot. 

Charles Dickens was the most popular novelist of his day. 
He was born in 1812. His father's ill-luck brought him 
to the debtors' prison, and the little boy at nine years of 
age was cast on his own resources. Much of the bitter ex- 
perience of those early days found its way into his auto- 
biographical novel, David Copperfield. The story of David 
in Murdstone and G-rinby's warehouse was the history of 
the sad and care-worn little boy, Charles Dickens, employed 
from one long week to another in pasting labels upon black- 
ing bottles. Of schooling he had next to none. When he 
was fourteen, he became a lawyer's office-boy, and here 
again the sharp-eyed, sharp-witted little fellow was laying 
up a store of material that came to good use later. The 
turning-point in his life was his decision to become a short- 
hand reporter. From taking down the words of other 
men, he soon came to write short pieces of his own. The 
Sketches by Boz attracted so much attention that they were 
gathered from the paper in which they had appeared and 
were republished in book form. The author, moreover, was 
invited to relate, in comic vein, the adventures of a club 
of sportsmen. The aid of a comic illustrator was enlisted 
to increase the fun. Such was the origin of TJie Pickwick 
Papers. With this book, Dickens' fame and fortune were 
made. He was now twenty-four ; he lived to be fifty-eight, 
and the years between are a record of literary prosperity 
such as falls to the lot of few writers. One success fol- 
lowed another : Oliver Tivist, Nicholas Nickleby, Old 
Curiosity Shop, and Barnaby Budge. Meanwhile, he had 
become as popular in America as in England, and when 
he visited this country in 1842, he was welcomed with en- 
thusiastic hospitality. Many people thought American 



THE NOVELISTS. 217 

Notes and Martin Chuzzletvit a poor return for their cor- 
dial reception ; but Dickens' exaggeration of American 
peculiarities is. on the whole, no greater than the extrava- 
gance of his English characters. He was a keen observer 
of superficial manners and customs rather than of the 
spirit and principles of the American people. After his 
visit to this country, he spent a year in Italy, and then, 
returning to London, he entered upon the busiest years of 
his active life. His literary career culminated in 1850, 
with the appearance of David Copperfield, the book that 
he himself as well as his public loved best among all his 
novels. "It will be easily believed," he said, "that I am 
a fond parent to every child of my fancy. But, like many 
fond parents, I have in my heart of hearts a favorite child 
— and his name is David Copperfield ! " Dickens wrote 
nothing that gave more pleasure or did more good than 
his Christmas Stories. A Christmas Carol, The Cricket 
on the Hearth, and The Chimes will outlive many of his 
longer works. 

In 1850 Dickens took charge of a weekly paper, called 
Household Words, and gained for it a large circulation. 
Afterwards he started his own All the Year Round, and 
contributed to it his later novels, in- serial form. 

His public readings from his own works were, rather 
than his writings, the success of his last years. Dickens, 
with his vigorous constitution and splendid vitality, should 
have lived to a good old age. He broke down under long- 
continued overwork, and died suddenly at his home at 
Gad's Hill, in 1870. 

To the mass of novel-readers, the name of Dickens is 
dearer than that of any other novelist. They love and 
bless him for his sympathy with the joys and sorrows of 
humble life, for his tenderness toward the old, the poor, 
the sick, and the discouraged. His sense of the pathetic 
is matched by his sense of the humorous ; and this, again, 



218 THE NOVELISTS. 

makes him a popular writer. Dickens never did anything 
by halves, — as he himself said, — and he was never pathetic 
or humorous by halves. In the judgment of the critical 
reader, his pathos too often descends to sentimentality, 
and his humor to farcical caricature. It is, however, 
Dickens' treatment of character to which such a reader 
must object most earnestly. His observation of peculiari- 
ties was marvelously keen ; but the result in his novels is 
not so much studies of character as studies of characteris- 
tics. That his men and women have some truth to nature 
cannot be denied, but they are faithful only to what is 
grotesque and unusual. Dickens, like Ben Jonson, de- 
picted " Every Man in his Humor." 

The moral purpose of Dickens did much to win him re- 
spect and affection. He was a good citizen, and had an 
honest desire to better the social condition of his country. 
His attacks on school, prison, and work-house abuses, and 
his exposure of the maladministration of justice, — all made 
his pen a powerful instrument of reform. His more general 
moral purpose was the teaching of kindliness and cheer- 
fulness — his " carol philosophy," he called it. 

Dickens' hold upon readers is through his humor, his 
pathos, and the gentle and humane teachings of his books, 
rather than through his knowledge or portrayal of human 
nature. He is gradually taking his place among the great 
humorists rather than among the great novelists of the 
English literature. 

William Makepeace Thackeray was eminent both as 
humorist and as novelist. He was born in 1811, in Cal- 
cutta, where his father and grandfather had been employed 
in the civil service. He was brought to England when a 
child, and sent to the Charter-house School, and afterward 
to Cambridge. The young man inherited a snug little 
fortune, and, had he been reasonably thrifty, might never 



THE NOVELISTS. 219 

have been driven to write for his bread and butter. His 
youthful follies helped him afterward to be very tolerant of 
young scapegraces, and to deal gently with Clive Newcome, 
Pendennis, and Philip. His desire was to become an art- 
ist, and he spent several years on the Continent with that 
end in view ; but when the need of money came, it was 
clear that some other means of earning it must be adopted. 
Not very hopefully, Thackeray took up his pen. He be- 
came a regular contributor to Eraser's Magazine, but not 
a petted and pampered one. While Dickens could com- 
mand any publisher and any price, Thackeray's articles 
were rejected or cut down. In 1841 Punch was estab- 
lished, and to this he contributed the Snob Papers, 
Jeames's Diary, and other writings in prose and verse. 

(1.) Thackeray's literary position was at last fixed by the 
appearance of Vanity Fair, in 1846. The novel was a pro- 
found satire upon English society. Before the last num- 
bers had appeared, Charlotte Bronte, a total stranger to 
Thackeray, had dedicated to him the second edition of 
Jane Eyre. She writes in her preface : — 

" There is a man in our own days whose words are not framed to 
tickle delicate ears; who, to my thinking, comes before the great 
ones of society, much as the son of Imlah came before the throned 
kings of Judah and Israel; and who speaks truth as deep, with 
a power as prophet-like and as vital — a mien as dauntless and as 
daring. . . . Why have I alluded to this man? I have alluded to 
him, Reader, because I think I see in him an intellect profounder and 
more unique than his contemporaries have yet recognized ; because I 
regard him as the first social regenerator of the day." 

(2. ) Pendennis is the record of a literary life, and in 
many of its details reflects the author's own experience. 
(3.) Henry Esmond is the most finished and artistic of the 
novels of Thackeray. His knowledge of the age of Queen 
Anne was almost as intimate and familiar as his acquaint- 
ance with the England of his own day. The writers of 



220 THE NOVELISTS. 

that age were his favorite study and model. It had long 
been his desire to write a history of the time ; but he per- 
haps turned his stores of knowledge to better account 
when he wrote the novel of Esmond. It is a marvelous 
resurrection of a past age, reproducing even in its language 
the England of Addison. 

(4. ) The most beloved of Thackeray's novels is probably 
The Newcomes ; certainly no other character that he has 
created holds such a place in our hearts as Colonel New- 
come. Thackeray gave as lectures in England and in 
America the delightful papers on The Four Georges and 
The English Humorists. 

Thackeray's novels have little plot. There is usually a 
hero whose adventures from infancy to middle age are 
chronicled in the old-fashioned, leisurely method of the 
eighteenth century novelists. In a work like Vanity Fair 
interest centres almost wholly in character. Becky Sharpe 
does not need to be wound up in the intricacies of an in- 
volved plot in order to become interesting. It is her char- 
acter more than her adventures that piques our curiosity 
and holds us in suspense. In the creation of character 
Thackeray's art is perfect. It would be foolish to deny 
that he shows us the dark side of life. His hope of mak- 
ing the world better is by warning it of evil rather than 
by holding up examples of good. He does not, like Dick- 
ens, exhort to cheerfulness ; but insists on sincerity, honor, 
and generosity. 

Thackeray's style has as its basis a most friendly and 
confidential relation with his reader. This leads him into 
frequent digressions and inartistic chatting about his char- 
acters ; but produces, on the other hand, a genial, free- 
and-easy, altogether delightful flow of racy, idiomatic En- 
glish. 

The personal character of Thackeray was long misjudged 
by careless readers of his books ; he was slow in winning 



THE NOVELISTS. 221 

that personal affection that from the first was lavished 
upon Dickens. Within recent years, Thackeray and his 
readers have been drawing closer together. They have 
learned to know the generons and high-souled, tender and 
pitiful nature of the man. " He wrote with a sigh rather 
than with a sneer," his public now believe. He never 
made a hero more generous than he was himself ; he never 
created a woman that had a tenderer heart, — this fierce 
satirist and grim misanthrope, as men thought him once. 

Dickens and Thackeray were in many points followers 
of the eighteenth century novelists. The novelist who be- 
longed wholly to her own time, who was a most character- 
istic product of the nineteenth century, and who most 
strongly influenced her age, was George Eliot. 

George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans Cross) was for many 
years "the most famous and the most unknown" woman 
of her time. When, after her death, the story of her life 
was given to the public, it was eagerly scanned for a more 
intimate and personal knowledge of the woman whom the 
world had long loved as the author. Mary Ann Evans was 
born in Warwickshire in 1819. She spent her childhood 
in the country, among the scenes and people that furnished 
her with her first and, in many respects, her best literary 
material. She was a quaint, old-fashioned little girl, diffi- 
dent and reserved with her companions. As a school-girl, 
she was chiefly famous for the compositions that she wrote 
and for her skill in music. The death of her mother and 
the marriage of her sister, left her at seventeen the head of 
her father's house. She was a proficient housewife, and a 
devoted daughter. Meanwhile, in the stillness and free- 
dom of her country home, she was beginning to lead an 
active intellectual life. Her eager mind reached out after 
knowledge in every direction. Her life was at this time 
also remarkable for its overstrained piety. She thought 



222 THE NOVELISTS. 

"Shakespeare dangerous," "music unholy"; and at the 
age of twenty, wrote of novels, " The weapons of Christian 
warfare were never sharpened at the forge of romance." 
In 1841, her father removed to Coventry, and his daughter 
at once found her place there in a little circle of singularly 
gifted and cultivated people. She continued her studies 
under a fresh inspiration. Her new friends turned her 
thoughts into different channels, and especially they influ- 
enced her religious convictions. By nature she was earnest 
and devout ; but she was now led to doubt and question 
the religious opinions that she had inherited. We have 
only to read her books, however, to feel her reverence for 
sincere beliefs of every shade. 

The first literary work of Miss Evans was an able trans- 
lation of Strauss' s Life of Jesus. She became known as a 
young woman of astonishing gifts, and the editor of the 
Westminster Review had such confidence in her ability 
that he invited her to come up to London to assist him in 
his editorial work. She was now able to measure herself 
with the best minds of her age. Herbert Spencer became 
her intimate friend, and he introduced to her his friend, 
George Henry Lewes. It was in 1854 that she entered 
upon her union with Mr. Lewes.* Mr. Lewes brought to 
light George Eliot the novelist. She had not written a 
page of fiction, up to the age of thirty-seven. In Black- 
wood's Magazine, in 1857, appeared her first attempt, The 
Sad Fortunes of the Reverend Amos Barton. This was the 
first of the Scenes from Clerical Life, and was followed by 
Mr. GilfiVs Love Story and Janet's Repentance, all written 
over the pseudonym George Eliot. The remainder of her 
life was eventful chiefly through the writing and reception 
of her books. The three novels that followed, Adam Bede, 
The Mill on the Floss, and Silas Marner, are her most pop- 

* Mr. Lewes, although separated from his first wife upon just and sufficient 
grounds, could not, according to English law, he divorced from her. 



THE NOVELISTS. 223 

ular works. Romola is a scholarly study of Florentine life 
in the fifteenth century, and at the same time a profound 
study of character. Felix Holt, the Radical, is the least 
attractive of her novels. Middlemarch and Daniel Deronda 
were the two works with which her career ended. 

In 1878 the death of Mr. Lewes filled all hearts with 
sympathy for George Eliot. Two years later, she was mar- 
ried to John Walter Cross, a London banker many years 
her junior. She lived but six months after her marriage. 

G-eorge Eliot regarded a novel as a study of human ex- 
perience, amusing, saddening, inspiring, profoundly in- 
structive as life itself. Such experience might, or it might 
not, make a complicated story. Most men's lives did not 
form an involved plot ; most men were neither saints nor 
sinners, fools nor geniuses. Her own words best express 
her creed as novelist : — 

" There are few prophets in the world; few sublimely beautiful 
women ; few heroes. I can't afford to give all my love and reverence 
to such rarities ; I want a great deal of those feelings for my every- 
day fellow-men, especially for the few in the foreground of the great 
multitude, whose faces I know, whose hands I touch, for whom I have 
to make way with kindly courtesy. ... It is more needful that my 
heart should swell with loving admiration at some trait of gentle 
goodness in the faulty people who sit at the same hearth with me, 
than at the deeds of heroes whom I shall never know except by 



But it must be remembered that George Eliot saw these 
commonplace people, like Amos Barton or Mr. Tulliver, 
with her matchless sympathy and insight, and that her art 
removes them from the commonplace. Writers without 
her genius have adopted her creed, and the result is to be 
seen in many of the weary novels of our day. 

George Eliot's method of presenting a character is ana- 
lytic rather than dramatic. She studies her characters 
scientifically, and gives the reader the scholarly results of 



224 THE NOVELISTS. 

her investigations ; she does not, like the dramatist, allow 
them to reveal themselves. Her report of the inner life of 
a man or woman is masterly in its knowledge of the human 
heart, in its truth and completeness. She has, like Shake- 
speare, humor and pathos in close union. Her humor is 
rich and mellow, and her pathos deep and tender. Her 
style, like her thought, is full of beauty and nourishment ; 
and, like her thought, it is at times heavy and labored. 

An earnest moral purpose has influenced the novelists of 
our time, and in no one has it been felt more strongly than 
in George Eliot. Live and teach, she said, should be a 
proverb as well as Live and learn. What she herself 
taught best was an exalted sense of duty to our fellow-men, 
— above all, the duty of "pity and fairness, two little 
words, which, carried out, would embrace the utmost deli- 
cacies of the moral life." Self-sacrifice, sympathy, and 
helpfulness are the lessons of her books. 

' ' Give me no light, great heaven, but such as turns 
To energy of human fellowship." 

She draws men together in a closer brotherhood, binding 
high and low, rich and poor, with the sense of common 
joys, and still oftener, of common sorrows and temptations. 
For George Eliot's world is, on the whole, a sad one. She 
acknowledges herself baffled by the sin and suffering that 
she sees and cannot account for. She is reduced to doubt 
and unbelief. This alone we are sure of, according to her 
teaching : — "that by desiring what is perfectly good, even 
when we do not quite know what it is, and cannot do what 
we would, we are part of the divine power against evil — 
widening the skirts of light and making the struggle with 
darkness narrower." 

Since Chaucer wrote, five hundred years ago, English 
literature has grown to maturity. It has lost its youthful 



THE NOVELISTS. 225 

freshness and spontaneity ; it is older, wiser, and sadder. 
Chaucer, joyous, hearty, naif, may well stand for the youth 
of our literature. G-eorge Eliot 's philosophic mind, scien- 
tific methods, carefully elaborated expression, her complete 
self-knowledge, her doubt and sadness, and, above all, her 
passionate " energy of human fellowship," make her the 
typical English writer of the age in which we live. 

Suggestions for Reading. — Dickens' Christmas Carol ; — Thack- 
eray's The Newcomes ; — George Eliot's Silas Marner. 



In this chapter we have considered:— 

1. Minor Novelists. 

2. Charles Dickens. 

3. William Makepeace Thackeray. 

4. George Eliot. 



SELECTIONS, 



Note. — It is advised that the class in English Literature should 
meet five times a week during one school year. One lesson in each 
week may be devoted to English Composition, the topics for written 
exercises being drawn from the subjects under discussion in the class. 
One lesson should be devoted to reading aloud from the authors 
studied. No pupil's work should be regarded as satisfactory until he 
can express in writing facts and impressions derived from his study, 
and until he can read alond with intelligent appreciation passages 
from the works of each author. For the latter purpose, the following 
selections are recommended. 



CHAUCER. 

In the portrait of the Clerk of Oxenford, notice the 
compression of the description, and, at the same time, its 
minute and truthful detail. See Chaucer's humorous, but 
delicate and sympathetic appreciation of the character. 
What historical interest has this portrait ? 

A Clerk ther was of Oxenford also, 
That unto logik hadde longe i-go. 
As lene was his hors as is a rake, 
And he was not right fat, I undertake; 
But lokede holwe, and therto soberly. 
Ful thredbare was his overeste courtepy, 
For he hadde geten him yit no benefice, 
Ne was so worldly for to have office. 
For him was levere have at his beddes heede 
Twenty bookes, clad in blak or reede, 
Of Aristotle and his philosophie, 
Then robes riche, or fithele, or gay sawtrie. 
But al be that he was a philosophre, 
Yet hadde he but litel gold in cof re ; 



228 SELECTIONS. 

But al that he mighte of his frendes hente, 
On bookes and on lernyng he it spente, 
And busily gan for the soules preye 
Of hem that yaf him wherwith to scoleye, 
Of studie took he most cure and most heede. 
Not oo word spak he more than was neede, 
And that was seid in forme and reverence 
And schort and quyk, and ful of high sentence. 
Sownynge in moral vertu was his speche, 
And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche. 

" Heere folweth the Prologe of the clerkes tale of Oxen- 
ford." The minor prologues that introduce the separate 
tales show us the Canterbury pilgrims as they ride along 
together, and joke and laugh and rally one another. The 
jovial host is the life of the party. He had stirred up 
Chaucer himself, who rode silent with eyes on the ground ; 
and now he turns upon the quiet and thoughtful Clerk of 
Oxenford, and good-naturedly orders him to tell "som 
merie tale." The tale is "Patient Griselda" : 

'Sir clerk of Oxenford,' our hoste sayde, 
' Ye ryde as coy and stille as dooth a mayde, 
Were newe spoused, sitting at the bord ; 
This day ne herde I of your tonge a word. 
I trowe ye studie aboute som sophyme, 
But Salomon seith, " euery thyng hath tyme." 

For goddes sake, as beth of bettre chere, 
It is no tyme for to studien here. 
Telle vs som merie tale, by your fey ; 
For what man that is entred in a pley, 
He nedes moot vnto the pley assente. 
But precheth nat, as freres doon in lente, 
To make vs for our olde synnes wepe, 
Ne that thy tale make vs nat to slepe. 

Telle vs som merie thing of auentures ; — 
Your termes, your colours, and your figures, 
Keepe hem in stoor til so be ye endyte 
Hy style, as whan that men to kinges wryte. 



CHAUCEE. 229 

Speketh so pleyn at this tyme, I yow preye, 
That we may vnderstonde what ye seye.' 
This worthy clerk benignely answerde, 
'Hoste,' quod he, ' I am vnder your yerde; 
Ye han of vs as now the gouernaunee, 
And therfor wol I do yow obeisaunce, 
As fer as reson axeth, hardily. 
I wol yow telle a tale which that I 
Lerned at Padowe of a worthy clerk, 
As preued by his wordes and his werk. 
He is now deed and nailed in his cheste, 
I prey to god so yiue his soule reste ! ' 

The story begins by telling of a certain Marquis,, the 
lord of a noble domain " at the west side of Itaille.-" He 
ruled his people so well that they declared : 

We 
Ne coude not vs self deuysen how 
We myghte liuen in more felicitee, 
Saue o thing, lord, if it your wille be, 
That for to been a wedded man yow leste, 
Than were your peple in souereyn hertes reste. 

With considerable reluctance, the Marquis consents to 
marry, but only on condition that he shall be permitted to 
choose his bride for himself : 

Lat me alone in chesing of my wyf, 
That charge vpon my bak I wol endure ; 
But I yow preye, and charge upon your lyf, 
That what wyf that I take, ye me assure 
To worshipe hir, whyl that hir lyf may dure, 
In word and werk, bothe here and euerywhere, 
As she an emperoures doughter were. 

The following stanzas tell how the Marquis chose his 
wife. The passage illustrates Chaucer's gently-flowing 
narrative, never in haste yet never flagging in interest. 



230 SELECTIONS. 

The simplicity of the style is partly to be traced to the 
directness and sincerity of the writer, partly to a youthful 
and artless age, when people expressed themselves much 
less subtly than they do at present. Notice the sweet and 
tender description of the young maiden Griselda and her 
humble life. 



Noght fer fro thilke paleys honurable 
Ther as this markis shoop his mariage, 
Ther stood a tlirop, of site delytable, 
In which that poure folk of that village 
Hadden her bestes and her herbergage, 
And of her labour tooke her sustenance 
After that the erthe yaf hem habundance. 

Amonges this poure folk ther dwelte a man 
Which that was holden pourest of hem alle ; 
But hye god som tyme senden can 
His grace in-to a litel oxes stalle : 
Ianicula men of that thrope him calle. 
A doughter hadde he fair ynough to syghte, 
And Grisildis this yonge mayden hyghte. 

But for to speke of vertuous beautee, 
Than was she oon the faireste vnder sonne ; 
For poureliche yfostred vp was she, 
No [sinful] lust was thurgh hir herte yronne ; 
Wei of ter of the welle than of the tonne 
She drank, and for she wolde vertu plese, 
She knew wel labour, but noon ydel ese. 

But though this mayde tendre were of age, 

Yet in the brest of hir virginitee 

Ther was enclosed rype and sad corage; 

And in greet reuerence and charitee 

Hir olde poure fader fostred she ; 

A fewe sheep spinning on feeld she kepte, 

She wolde nought been ydel til she slepte. 



GHAUCEE. 231 

And whan she horn ward cam, she wolde bringe 

Wortes or othere herbes tymes ofte, 

The whiche she shredde and seeth for hir liuinge, 

And made hir bed ful harde and no thing softe; 

And ay she kepte hir fadres lyf on-lofte 

With euerich obeisaunce and diligence 

That child may doon to fadres reuerence. 

Vp-on Grisild this poure creature 
Ful ofte sythe this markis sette his ye 
As he on hunting rood parauenture ; 
And whan it fil that he myghte hir espye, 
He nought with wantoun loking of folye 
His yen caste on hir, but in sad wyse 
Vp-on hir chere he woulde him ofte auyse, 

Commending in his herte hir wommanhede, 
And eek hir vertu, passing any wyght 
Of so yong age, as wel in chere as dede. 
For though the peple haue no greet insyght 
In vertu, he considered ful ryght 
Hir bountee, and disposed that he wolde 
Wedde hir oonly, if euer he wedde sholde. 

The day of wedding cam, but no wyght can 
Telle what womman that it sholde be ; 
For which merueille wondred many a man, 
And seyden, whan they were in priuetee, 
'Wol nat our lord yet leue his vanitee? 
Wol he nat wedde ? alias, alias the whyle ! 
Why wol he thus him-self and vs bigyle ? 

But natheles this markis hath doon make 
Of gemmes, set in gold and in asure, 
Broches and ringes, for Grisildis sake, 
And of hir clothing took he the mesure 
By a mayde, lyk to hir stature, 
And eek of othere ornamentes alle 
That vn-to swich a wedding sholde falle. 



232 SELECTIONS. 

The tyme of vndern of the same day 
Approcheth, that this wedding sholde be ; 
And al the paleys put was in array, 
Bothe halle and chambres, ech in his degree; 
Houses of office stuffed with plentee 
Ther maystow seen of deynteuous vitaille, 
That may be founde, as fer as last Itaille. 

This roial markis richely arrayed, 
Lordes and ladyes in his companye, 
The whiche vnto the feste were yprayed, 
And of his retenue the bachelrye, 
With many a soun of sondry melodye, 
Vn-to the village, of the which I tolde, 
In this array the ryghte wey han holde. 

Grisilde of this, god wot, ful innocent, 

That for hir shapen was al this array, 

To fecchen water at a welle is went, 

And cometh hoom as soone as euer she may. 

For wel she had herd seyd, that thilke day 

The markis sholde wedde, and, if she myghte, 

She wolde fayn han seyn som of that syghte. 

She thoughte, ' I wol with othere maydens stonde, 

That been my felawes, in our dore, and se 

The markisesse, and therfor wol I fonde 

To doon at hoom, as soone as it may be, 

The labour which that longeth vn-to me ; 

And than I may at leyser hir biholde, 

If she this wey vn-to the castel holde.' 



And as she wolde ouer hir threshfold goon, 
The markis cam and gan hir for to calle ; 
And she sette doun hir water-pot anoon 
Bisyde the threshfold, in an oxes stalle, 
And doun vp-on hir knees she gan to falle, 
And with sad contenance kneleth stille 
Til she had herd what was the lordes wille. 



CHAUCEE. 233 

This thoughtful markis spak vn-to this mayde 
Ful sobrely, and seyde in this manere, 
' Wher is your fader, Grisildis? ' he sayde, 
And she with reuerence, in humble chere, 
Answerde, ' lord, he is al redy here.' 
And in she gooth with-outen lenger lette, 
And to the markis she hir fader fette. 



He by the hond than took this olde man, 
And seyde thus, whan he him hadde asyde, 
-' Ianicula, I neither may ne can 
Lenger the plesance of myn lferte hyde. 
If that thou vouche sauf, what so bityde, 
Thy doughter wol I take er that I wende 
As for my wyf, vn-to hir lyues ende. 

Thou louest me, I wot it wel certeyn, 
And art my f eithf ul lige man ybore ; 
And al that lyketh me, I dar wel seyn, 
It lyketh thee, and specially therfore 
Tel me that poynt that I haue seyd bifore, 
If that thou wolt vn-to that purpos drawe 
To take me as for thy sone in lawe ? ' 

This sodeyn cas this man astonied so, 
That reed he wex, abayst, and al quaking 
He stood ; vnnethes seyde he wordes mo, 
But only thus: ' lord,' quod he, ' my willing 
Is as ye wole, ne ayeins youre lyking 
I wol no-thing ; ye be my lord so dere ; 
Ryght as yow lust gouerneth this matere.' 

'Yet wol I,' quod this markis softely, 
' That in thy chambre I and thou and she 
Haue a collaeion, and wostow why? 
For I wol axe if it hir wille be 
To be my wyf, and reule hir after me ; 
And al .this shal be doon in thy presence, 
I wol nought speke out of thyn audience.' 



534 SELECTIONS. 

And in the chambre whyl they were aboute 
Her tretys, which as ye shal after here, 
The peple cam vn-to the hous with-oute, 
And wondred hem in how honest manere 
And tentifly she kepte hir fader dere. 
But outerly Grisildis wondre myghte, 
For neuer erst ne sey she swich a syghte. 

No wonder is though that she were astoned 
To seen so greet a gest come in that place ; 
She neuer was to swiche gestes woned, 
For which she lok#l with f ul pale face. 
But shortly forth this tale for to chace, 
Thise arn the worcles that the markis sayde 
To this benigne verray feithful mayde. 

' Grisilde, ' he seyde, ' ye shul wel vnderstonde 

It lyketh to your fader and to me 

That I yow wedde, and eek it may so stonde, 

As I suppose, ye wol that it so be. 

But thise demandes axe I first,' quod he, 

' That, sith it shal be doon in hastif wyse, 

Wol ye assente or elles yow auyse? 

I seye this, be ye redy with good herte 

To al my lust, and that I frely may, 

As me best thinketh, do yow laughe or smerte, 

And neuer ye to grucche it, nyght ne day? 

And eek whan I sey ' ye, ' ne sey nat ' nay,' 

Neither by word ne frowning contenance ; 

Swer this, and here I swere our alliance.' 

Wondring vp-on this word, quaking for drede, 
She seyde, ' lord, vndigne and vnworthy 
Am I to thilke honour that ye me bede ; 
But as ye wol your-self, ryght so wol I. 
And heer I swere that neuer willingly 
In werk ne thought I nil yow disobeye, » 
For to be deed, though me were loth to deye.' 






CHAUCER. 235 

'This is ynough, Grisilde myn! ' quod he. 
And forth he goth with a ful sobre chere 
Out at the dore, and after that cam she, 
And to the peple he seyde in this manere, 
' This is my wyf , ' quod he, ' that standeth here. 
Honoureth hir, and loueth hir, I preye, 
Who so me loueth; ther is namore to seye.' 

And for that no-thing of hir olde gere 
She sholde bringe in-to his hous, he bad 
That wommen sholde dispoilen hir ryght there ; 
Of which thise ladyes were nat ryght glad 
To handle hir clothes wher-in she was clad. 
But natheles this mayde bryght of hewe 
Fro foot to heed they clothed han al newe. 

Hir heres han they kembd, that lay vntressed 
Ful rudely, and with her fingres smale 
A corone on hir heed they han ydressed, 
And sette hir ful of nowches grete and smale ; 
Of hir array what sholde I make a tale ? 
Vnnethe the peple hir knew for hir fairnesse, 
Whan she translated was in swich richesse. 

This markis hath hir spoused with a ring 
Brought for the same cause, and than hir sette 
Vp-on an hors, snow-whyt and wel ambling, 
And to his paleys, er he lenger lette, 
With ioyful peple that hir ladde and mette, 
Conueyed hir, and thus the day they spende 
In reuel til the sonne gan descende. 

And shortly forth this tale for to chace, 

I seye that to this newe markisesse 

God hath swich fauour sent hir of his grace, 

That it ne semed nat by lyklinesse 

That she was born and fed in rudenesse, 

As in a cote or in an oxe-stalle, 

But norished in an emperoures halle. 



236 SELECTIONS. 

For though that euer vertuous was she, 
She was encressed in swich excellence 
Of thewes goode, yset in heigh bountee, 
And so discreet and fair of eloquence, 
So benigne and so digne of reuerence, 
And coude so the peples herte embrace, 
That ech hir louede that loked on hir face. 



The story then goes on to relate the trials of Griselda's 
married life, and to extol the patience -with which she hore 
them. The story is beautifully told, but the incidents are, 
to modern taste, cruel and absurd. 



SPENSER. 

If the pupil enter fully into the spirit of the four stanzas 
that follow, he will enjoy The Faerie Queene. The music 
of the verse will convey much of this spirit. These stanzas 
have at once the spaciousness and picturesqueness, the 
elevation and distinction that will be found characteristic 
of the whole poem. We feel at the outset that we are in 
an ideal world, remote from every-day life. We may, 
indeed, use Spenser's own line to describe Tlie Faerie 
Queene: 

" The world's sweet inn from pain and wearisome turmoil." 

A gentle Knight was pricking on the plaine, 
Ycladd in mightie armes and silver shielde, 
Wherein old dints of deepe wounds did remaine, 
The cruel markes of many a bloudy fielde ; 
Yet armes till that time did he never wield : 
His angry steede did chide his foming bitt, 
As much disdayning to the curbe to yield : 
Full jolly knight he seemd, and faire did sitt, 
As one for knightly giusts and fierce encounters fitt. 



SPENSER. 237 

And on his brest a bloudie crosse he bore, 
The deare remembrance of his dying Lord, 
For whose sweete sake that glorious badge he wore, 
And dead as living ever him ador'd : 
Upon his shield the like was also scor'd, 
For soveraine hope, which in his helpe he had : 
Right faithfull true he was in deede and word, 
But of his cheere did seeme too solemne sad ; 
Yet nothing did he dread, but ever was ydrad. 

Upon a great adventure he was bond, 

That greatest Gloriana to him gave, 
. That greatest glorious Queene of Faerie lond, 

To winne him worship, and her grace to have, 

Which of all earthly things he most did crave ; 

And ever as he rode, his hart did earne 

To prove his puissance in battell brave 

Upon his foe, and his new force to learne ; 
Upon his foe, a dragon horrible and stearne. 

A lovely ladie rode him faire beside, 

Upon a lowly asse more white then snow, 

Yet she much whiter, but the same did hide 

Under a vele, that wimpled was full low, 

And over all a blacke stole she did throw, 

As one that inly mournd : so was she sad, 

And heavie sat upon her palfrey slow : 

Seemed in heart some hidden care she had, 

And by her in a line a milke white lambe she lad. 

The following selection is an illustration of Spenser's 
descriptive power. There is high imagination in this por- 
trait of Belphcebe,, and there are also the fanciful conceits 
that marked the poetry of Spenser's age. The description 
is rich and splendid with the "seld-seen costly" words that 
are so characteristic of Spenser's poetry. The passage has 
additional interest from the fact that it is one of those 
extravagant compliments to Queen Elizabeth for which 
Spenser was famous. 



238 • SELECTIONS. 

Eftsoone there stepped foorth 
A goodly ladie clad in hunters weed, 
That seemd to be a woman of great worth. 
And by her stately portance borne of heavenly birth. 

Her face so faire, as flesh it seemed not, 
But heavenly pourtraict of bright angels hew, 
Cleare as the skie, withouten blame or blot, 
Through goodly mixture of complexions dew; 
And in her cheekes the vermeill red did shew 
Like roses in a bed of lillies shed, 
The which ambrosiall odours from them threw. 
And gazers sence with double pleasure fed, 
Hable to heale the sicke and to revive the ded. 



In her faire eyes two living lamps did flame, . 
Kindled above at th' hevenly makers light, 
And darted fyrie beames out of the same, 
So passing persant, and so wondrous bright, 
That quite bereav'd the rash beholders sight : 
In them the blinded god his lustfull fire 
To kindle oft assayd, but had no might ; 
For, with dredd maiestie and awfull yre, 
She broke his wanton darts, and quenched base desire. 

Her ivorie forhead, full of bountie brave, 
Like a broad table did itselfe dispred, 
For Love his loftie triumphes to engrave, 
And write the battels of his great godhead : 
All good and honour might therein be red : 
For there their dwelling was. And, when she spake, 
Sweete wordes, like dropping honny, she did shed, 
And twixt the perles and rubins softly brake 
A silver sound, that heavenly musicke seemd to make. 

Upon her eyelids many graces sate, 
Under the shadow of her even browes, 
Working belgards and amorous retrate, 
And everie one her with a grace endowes : 



SPENSER. 239 

And everie one with meekenesse to her bowes. 
So glorious mirrhour of celestiall grace, 
And soveraine moniment of mortall vowes, 
How shall fraile pen descrive her heavenly face, 
For f eare through want of skill her beauty to disgrace. 

So faire, and thousand thousand times more faire, 
She seemd, when she presented was to sight ; 
And was yclad, for heat of scorching aire, 
All in a silken Camus lilly whight, 
Purfled upon with many a folded plight, 
Which all above besprinckled was throughout 
With golden aygulets, that glistred bright 
Like twinckling starres ; and all the skirt about 
Was hemd with golden fringe. 



Her yellow lockes, crisped like golden wyre, 
About her shoulders weren loosely shed, 
And when the winde emongst them did inspyre, 
They waved like a penon wyde dispred, 
And low behinde her backe were scattered : 
And, whether art it were or heedelesse hap, 
As through the flouring f orrest rash she fled, 
In her rude haires sweet flowres themselves did lap, 
And flourishing fresh leaves and blossomes did enwrap. 

Book II., Canto III. 

Spenser, following a fashion of the Italian poets, began 
each canto of his work with some general reflections in 
harmony with the incidents he was about to relate. These 
little introductions are often of rare beauty. One of the 
loveliest is given here : 



And is there care in heaven? And is there love 
In heavenly spirits to these creatures bace, 
That may compassion of their evils move? 
There is : — else much more wretched were the cace 



240 SELECTIONS. 

Of men then beasts. But th' exceeding grace 
Of highest God, that loves his creatures so, 
And ail his workes with mercy doth embrace, 
That blessed angels he sends to and fro, 
To serve to wicked man, to serve his wicked foe! 

How oft do they their silver bowers leave 
To come to succour us that succour want, 
How oft do they with golden pineons cleave 
The flitting skyes, like flying pursuivant, 
Against f owle f eendes to ayd us militant : 
They for us fight, they watch and dewly ward, v 
And their bright squadrons round about us plant ; 
And all for love and nothing for reward : 
0, why should hevenly Grod to men have such regard? 

Book II, Canto VIII. 

Each member of the class should select his favorite 
passage from the First Book for reading aloud iu recita- 
tion. 

SHAKESPEARE. 

Short extracts from a dramatist convey but a feeble im- 
pression of his skill as a playwright or as a creator of char- 
acter. The following selections from Shakespeare are 
mainly for the illustration of his thought, imagination, 
and expression. 

The scene from The Merchant of Venice presents to us 
one of the most thrilling moments of the play. The father 
of Portia, so the story runs, had feared some fortune- 
hunter might seek to win her hand, and had therefore 
at his death devised a scheme by which to test the 
sincerity and worth of her lovers. Three caskets, of gold, 
silver, and lead, were to be placed before each suitor, and 
according to the choice he made, his fate was to be decided. 
One after another had tried his fortune, and had failed 






SHAKESPEARE. 241 

to win the fair Portia. Now comes Bassanio, and Portia's 
heart beats high ; for it is he whom she loves. She has 
confessed nothing in words ; but Bassanio has confided to 
his friend Antonio that "sometimes from her eyes" he 
"did receive fair speechless messages." 

Act III., Scene II. Belmont. A room in Portia's house. 
Enter Bassanio, Portia, Gratiano, Nerissa, and Attendants. 

Portia. I pray you, tarry : pause a day or two 
Before you hazard ; for, in choosing wrong, 
I lose your company : therefore forbear a while. 
There's something tells me, but it is not love, 
I would not lose you ; and you know yourself, 
Hate counsels not in such a quality. 
But lest you should not understand me well, — 
And yet a maiden hath no tongue but thought, — 
I would detain you here some month or two, 
Before you venture for me. I could teach you 
How to choose right, but then I am forsworn; 
So will I never be: so may you miss me; 
But if you do, you'll make me wish a sin, 
That I had been forsworn. Beshrew your eyes, 
They have o'erlook'd me and divided me; 
One half of me is yours, the other half yours, — 
Mine own, I would say ; but if mine, then yours, 
And so all yours. 0, these naughty times 
Put bars between the owners and their rights ! 
And so, though yours, not yours. Prove it so, 
Let fortune go to hell for it, not I. 
I speak too long ! but 'tis to peize the time, 
To eke it, and to draw it out in length, 
To stay you from election. 

Bassanio. Let me choose; 

For as I am, I live upon the rack. 

Portia. Upon the rack, Bassanio ! then confess 
What treason there is mingled with your love. 

Bassanio. None but that ugly treason of mistrust, 
Which makes me fear the enjoying of my love. 



242 SELECTIONS. 

There may as well be amity and life 

'Tween snow and fire, as treason and my love. 

Portia. Ay, but I fear you speak upon the rack, 
Where men enforced do speak anything. 

Bassanio. Promise me life, and I'll confess the truth. 

Portia. Well then, confess and live. 

Bassanio. Confess and love 

Had been the very sum of my confession. 
happy torment, when my torturer 
Doth teach me answers for deliverance ! 
But let me to my fortune and the caskets. 

Portia. Away, then ! I am lock'd in one of them : 
If you do love me, you will find me out. 
Nerissa and the rest, stand all aloof. — 
Let music sound while he doth make his choice; 
Then, if he lose, he makes a swan-like end, 
Fading in music : that the comparison 
May stand more proper, my eye shall be the stream 
And watery death-bed for him. He may win ; 
And what is music then? Then music is 
Even as the flourish when true subjects bow 
To a new-crowned monarch : such it is 
As are those dulcet sounds in break of day, 
That creep into the dreaming bridegroom's ear, 
And summon him to marriage. Now he goes, 
With no less presence, but with much more love, 
Than young Alcides, when he did redeem 
The virgin tribute paid by howling Troy 
To the sea-monster : I stand for sacrifice ; 
The rest aloof are the Dardanian wives, 
With bleared visages, come forth to view 
The issue of th' exploit. Go, Hercules! 
Live thou, I live. — With much more dismay 
I view the fight, than thou that mak'st the fray. 

A song, whilst Bassanio comments on the caskets to himself. 

Bas. So may the outward shews be least themselves: 
The world is still deceiv'd with ornament. 
In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt 
But, being season'd with a gracious voice, 






SHAKESPEAEE. 243 

Obscures the shew of evil? In religion, 

What damned error, but some sober brow 

Will bless it, and approve it with a text, 

Hiding the grossness with fair ornament ? 

There is no vice so simple but assumes 

Some mark of virtue on his outward parts : 

How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false 

As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their chins 

The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars, 

Who, inward search'd, have livers white as milk ; 

And these assume but valour's excrement 

To render them redoubted ! Look on beauty, 

And you shall see 'tis purchas'd by the weight ; 

Which therein works a miracle in nature, 

Making them lightest that wear most of it: 

So are those crisped snaky golden locks, 

Which make such wanton gambols with the wind, 

Upon supposed fairness, often known 

To be the dowry of a second head ; 

The skull that bred them, in the sepulchre. 

Thus ornament is but the guiled shore 

To a most dangerous sea, the beauteous scarf 

Veiling an Indian beauty; — in a word, 

The seeming truth which cunning times put on 

To entrap the wisest. Therefore, thou gaudy gold, 

Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee ; 

Nor none of thee, thou pale and common drudge 

'Tween man and man : but thou, thou meagre lead, 

Which rather threat'nest than dost promise aught, 

Thy plainness moves me more than eloquence ; 

And here choose I. Joy be the consequence ! 

Portia [Aside]. How all the other passions fleet to air, 
As doubtful thoughts, and rash-embrac'd despair, 
And shuddering fear, and green-eyed jealousy ! 

love ! be moderate ; allay thy ecstasy ; 
In measure rain thy joy ; scant this excess. 

1 feel too much thy blessing ; make it less, 
For fear I surfeit. 

Bassanio. What find I here? 

[Opening the leaden casket. 
Fair Portia's counterfeit I What demi-god 



244 SELECTIONS. 

Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes? 

Or whether, riding on the balls of mine, 

Seem they in motion? Here are sever'd lips, 

Parted with sugar breath : so sweet a bar 

Should sunder such sweet friends. Here in her hairs 

The painter plays the spider, and hath woven 

A golden mesh t' entrap the hearts of men 

Faster than gnats in cobwebs: but her eyes! — 

How could he see to do them? having made one, 

Methinks it should have power to steal both his, 

And leave itself unfurnish'd. Yet look, how far 

The substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow 

In underprizing it, so far this shadow 

Doth limp behind the substance. — Here's the scroll, 

The continent and summary of my fortune. 

You that choose not by the view, 
Chance as fair, and choose as true ! 
Since this fortune falls to you, 
Be content and seek no new. 
If you be well pleas' d with this, 
And hold your fortune for your bliss, 
Turn you where your lady is, 
And claim her with a loving kiss. 

A gentle scroll. — Fair lady, by your leave; 

I come by note, to give and to receive. [Kissing her. 

Like one of two contending in a prize, 

That thinks he hath done well in people's eyes, 

Hearing applause and universal shout, 

Giddy in spirit, still gazing in a doubt 

Whether those peals of praise be his or no ; 

So, thrice-fair lady, stand I, even so, 

As doubtful whether what I see be true, 

Until confirm'd, sign'd, ratified by you. 

Portia. You see me, Lord Bassanio, where I stand, 
Such as I am : though for myself alone 
I would not be ambitious in my wish, 
To wish myself much better; yet, for you 
I would be trebled twenty times myself, 
A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times more rich, 
That only to stand high in your account, 






SHAKESPEARE. 245 

I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends, 
Exceed account: but the full sum of me 
Is sum of nothing; which, to term in gross, 
Is an unlesson'd girl, unschool'd, unpractis'd : 
Happy in this, she is not yet so old 
But she may learn ; happier than this, 
She is not bred so dull but she can learn ; 
Happiest of all in that her gentle spirit 
Commits itself to yours to be directed, 
As from her lord, her governor, her king. 
Myself and what is mine to you and yours 
Is now converted : but now I was the lord 
Of this fair mansion, master of my servants, 
Queen o'er myself ; and even now, but now, 
This house, these_ servants, and this same myself 
Are yours, my lord. I give them with this ring ; 
Which when you part from, lose, or give away, 
Let it presage the ruin of your love, 
And be my vantage to exclaim on you. 

Bassanio. Madam, you have bereft me of all words; 
Only my blood speaks to you in my veins : 
And there is such confusion in my powers 
As, after some oration fairly spoke 
By a beloved prince, there doth appear 
Among the buzzing pleased multitude ; 
Where every something, being blent together, 
Turns to a wild of nothing, save of joy, 
Express'd and not express'd. But when this ring 
Parts from this finger, then parts life from hence : 
0, then be bold to say, Bassanio's dead ! 

The preceding scene from The Merchant of Venice has 
shown us one phase of the character of Portia. The scene 
that follows will throw light on the other great character 
of this play, the Jewish money-lender, Shylock. Antonio 
has borrowed money of him, and has agreed to forfeit a 
pound of flesh if he should not be able to pay the debt on 
the day appointed. Another circumstance referred to in 
this scene is the flight of Jessica, Shylock's daughter, from 



246 SELECTIOKS. 

her father's house. She has carried away with her a store 
of his hoarded ducats. 

Salanio. How now, Shy lock? what news among the merchants? 

Shylock. You knew, none so well, none so well as you, of my 
daughter's flight. 

Salarino. That's certain : I, for my part, knew the tailor that made 
the wings she flew withal. 

Shylock. My own flesh and blood to rebel ! 

Salarino. There is more difference between thy flesh and hers 
than between jet and ivory ; more between your bloods than there is 
between red wine and Rhenish. But tell us, do you hear whether 
Antonio have had any loss at sea or no ? 

Shylock. There I have another bad match : a bankrupt, a prodigal, 
who dare scarce show his head on the Rialto ; a beggar, that was used 
to come so smug upon the mart ; let him look to his bond : he was 
wont to call me usurer ; let him look to his bond : he was wont to 
lend money for a Christian courtesy; let him look to his bond. 

Salarino. Why, I am sure, if he* forfeit, thou wilt not take his 
flesh: what's that good for? 

Shylock. To bait fish withal : if it will feed nothing else, it will 
feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me, and hindered me half a 
million; laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my na- 
tion, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies; 
and what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not 
a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions ? fed 
with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same 
diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same 
winter and summer, as a Christian is ! If you prick us, do we not 
bleed ? if you tickle us, do we not laugh ? if you poison us, do we not 
die ? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge ? If we are like you 
in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, 
what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what 
should his sufferance be, by Christian example? Why, revenge. The 
villany you teach me, I will execute ; and it shall go hard but I will 
better the instruction. 

Enter a Servant. 

Servant. Gentlemen, my master Antonio is at his house, and de- 
sires to speak with you both. 

Salarino. We have been up and down to seek him. 



SHAKESPEARE. 247 

Enter Tubal. 

Salanio. Here comes another of the tribe: a third cannot be 
matched, unless the devil himself turn Jew. 

[Exeunt Salanio, Salarino, and Servant. 

ShylocJc. How now, Tubal! what news from Genoa? hast thou 
found my daughter ? 

Tubal. I often came where I did hear of her, but cannot find her. 

ShylocJc. Why, there, there, there, there ! a diamond gone, cost 
me two thousand ducats in Frankfort ! The curse never fell upon our 
nation till now ; I never felt it till now ; two thousand ducats in that ; 
and other precious, precious jewels. I would my daughter were dead 
at my foot, and the jewels in her ear ! Would she were hearsed at my 
foot, and the ducats in her coffin! No news of them? — Why, so: and 
I know not how much is spent in the search : why, thou loss upon 
loss! the thief gone with so much, and so much to find the thief; 
and no satisfaction, no revenge : nor no ill luck stirring but what 
lights o' my shoulders ; no sighs but o' my breathing ; no tears but o' 
my shedding. 

Tubal. Yes, other men have ill luck too. Antonio, as I heard in 
Genoa, — 

ShylocJc, What, what, what? ill luck, ill luck? 

Tubal. Hath an argosy cast away, coming from Tripolis. 

ShylocJc. I thank God! I thank God! Is it true? is it true? 

Tubal. I spoke with some of the sailors that escaped the wrack. 

ShylocJc. I thank thee, good Tubal! — Good news, good news! ha, 
ha! — Where? in Genoa? 

Tubal. Your daughter spent in Genoa, as I heard, in one night 
fourscore ducats. 

ShylocJc. Thou stick'st a dagger in me. I shall never see my gold 
again. Fourscore ducats at a sitting ! fourscore ducats ! 

Tubal. There came divers of Antonio's creditors in my company 
to Venice, that swear he cannot choose but break. 

ShylocJc. I am very glad of it. I'll plague him ; I'll torture him. 
I am glad of it. 

Tubal. One of them shewed me a ring that he had of your daughter 
for a monkey. 

SJiylocJc. Out upon her! Thou torturest me, Tubal: it was my 
turquoise ; I had it of Leah when I was a bachelor : I would not have 
given it for a wilderness of monkeys. 

Tubal. But Antonio is certainly undone. 



248 SELECTIONS. 

Shylock. Nay, that's true, that's very true. Go, Tubal, fee me an 
officer; bespeak him a fortnight before. I will have the heart of him, 
if he forfeit ; for, were he out of Venice, I can make what merchandise 
I will. Go, go, Tubal, and meet me at our synagogue : go, good Tubal ; 
at our synagogue, Tubal. [Exeunt. 

Act HE., Scene 1. 

The following selection is from the play of Hamlet. A 
band of strolling players have arrived at the castle of 
Elsinore, and are about to act a play before the conrt (see 
page 41). Hamlet, who is a theatre-goer and accomplished 
critic of the stage, gives the players some excellent advice. 

Scene II. A Hall in the Castle. 
Enter Hamlet and Players. 

Hamlet. Speak the speech, 1 pray you, as I pronounced it to you, 
trippingly on the tongue ; but if you mouth it, as many of your 
players do, I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not 
saw the air too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently ; for in 
the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say, the whirlwind of pas- 
sion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it 
smoothness. 0, it otfends me .to the soul to hear a robustious periwig- 
pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of 
the groundlings, who for the most part are capable of nothing but 
inexplicable dumb-shows and noise. I could have such a fellow 
whipped for o'erdoing Termagant ; it out-herods Herod : pray you, 
avoid it. 

1 Player. I warrant your honour. 

Hamlet. Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion be 
your tutor : suit the action to the word, the word to the action ; with 
this special observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of nature ; 
for any thing so overdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, 
both at the first and now, was and is, to hold, as 't were, the mirror 
up to nature; to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, 
and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure. Now 
this overdone, or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful laugh, 
cannot but make the judicious grieve; the censure of the which one 
must in your allowance o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. 0, there 
be players that I have seen play, and heard others praise, and that 



SHAKESPEARE. 249 

highly, not to speak it profanely, that, neither having the accent of 
Christians nor the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so strutted 
and bellowed that I have thought some of nature's journeymen had 
made men and not made them well, they imitated humanity so 
abominably. 

1 Player. I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us, sir. 

Hamlet. 0, reform it altogether. And let those that play your 
clowns speak no more than is set down for them ; for there be of them 
that will themselves laugh, to set on some quantity of barren specta- 
tors to laugh too, though in the mean time some necessary question of 
the play be then to be considered : that 's villanous, and shows a most 
pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready. 

[Exeunt Players. 
Act m., Scene 2. 

The famous soliloquy that follows shows Hamlet in a 
very different mood. He feels his sorrows too heavy to 
bear ; he wishes life were over, and yet, when he comes 
face to face with death, he shrinks back in awe from the 
vast unknown beyond the grave. This speech of Hamlet 
expresses "the burden and the mystery" that most thought- 
ful people feel in certain moods. 

Hamlet. To be, or not to be, — that is the question: 
Whether 't is nobler in the mind to suffer 
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, 
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, 
And by opposing end them? To die, — to sleep, — 
No more; and by a sleep to say we end 
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks 
That flesh is heir to, — 't is a consummation 
Devoutly to be wish'cl. To die, — to sleep, — 
To sleep! perchance to dream! ay, there 's the rub; 
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come 
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, 
Must give us pause : there 's the respect 
That makes calamity of so long life ; 
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, 
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, 
The pangs of dispriz'd love, the law's delay, 



250 SELECTIONS. 

The insolence of office, and the spurns 

That patient merit of the unworthy takes, 

When he himself might his quietus make 

With a bare bodkin ? who would fardels bear, 

To grunt and sweat under a weary life, 

But that the dread of something after death, 

The undiscover'd country from whose bourn 

No traveller returns, puzzles the will, 

And makes us rather bear those ills we have 

Than fly to others that we know not of? 

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all; 

And thus the native hue of resolution 

Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought, 

And enterprises of great pith and moment 

With this regard their currents turn awry, 

And lose the name of action. 

Act EX, Scene 1. 

Throughout the plays of Shakespeare, and of the other 
Elizabethan dramatists, are scattered lovely bits of song. 
The first given here is from Cymbeline, and is a morning 
song to awaken the sleeping Imogen : "a, wonderful sweet 
air, with admirable rich words to it." 

Hark, hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings, 

And Phoebus gins arise, 
His steeds to water at those springs 

On chalic'd flowers that lies ; 
And winking Mary-buds begin 
To ope their golden eyes ; 

With everything that pretty is, 
My lady sweet, arise ; 
Arise, arise! 

The next selection is the song of the "dainty Ariel/' the 
exquisite little sprite who serves the magician Prospero, in 
the play of TJie Tempest. 

Where the bee sucks, there suck I: 
In a cowslip's bell I lie ; 



SHAKESPEARE. 251 

There I couch when owls do cry. 
On the bat's back I do fly 
After Summer, merrily. 
^^^ Merrily, merrily, shall I live now, 

Under the blossom that hangs on the bough. 

The following is one of Shakespeare's most beautiful 
sonnets upon friendship : 

Let me not to the marriage of true minds 

Admit impediments. Love is not love 

Which alters when it alteration finds, 

Or bends with the remover to remove : 

0, no ! it is an ever-fixed mark 

That looks on tempests and is never shaken ; 

It is the star to every wandering bark, 

Whose worth 's unknown, although his height be taken. 

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks 

Within his bending sickle's compass come ; 

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 

But bears it out even to the edge of doom. 

If this be error and upon me prov'd, 

I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd. 

It is suggested that the pupil commit to memory several 
of the following brief extracts from Shakespeare: 

I saw young Harry, with his beaver on, 

His cuisses on his thighs, gallantly armed, 

Rise from the ground like feathered Mercury, 

And vaulted with such ease into his seat, 

As if an angel dropped down from the clouds, 

To turn and wind a fiery Pegasus 

And witch the world with noble horsemanship. 

King Henry IV., Part L— Act IV., Scene 1. 

Sweet are the uses of adversity, 

Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, 

Wears yet a precious jewel in his head; 



252 SELECTIONS. 

And this our life exempt from public haunt 

Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 

Sermons in stones and good in everything. 

As You Like It.— Act II., Scene 1. 

And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, 

The cloud-capped towers, the great globe itself, 

Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, 

And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, 

Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff 

As dreams are made on ; and our little life 

Is rounded with a sleep. 

The Tempest— Act IV., Scene 1. 

How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank! 
Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music 
Creep in our ears : soft stillness and the night 
Become the touches of sweet harmony. 
Sit, Jessica. Look how the floor of heaven 
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold : 
There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st 
But in his motion like an angel sings, 
Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins ; 
Such harmony is in immortal souls ; 
But whilst this muddy vesture of decay 
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it. 

The Merchant of Venice.— Act V., Scene 1. 

The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, 

Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven ; 

And as imagination bodies forth 

The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen 

Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing 

A local habitation and a name. 

A Midsummer Night's Dream.— Act V., Scene 1. 

If music be the food of love, play on ; 
That strain again ! it had a dying fall ; 
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound 
That breathes upon a bank of violets, 
Stealing and giving odour ! 

Twelfth Mght.—Act I., Scene 1. 



B A C sr . 253 

The man that hath no music in himself, 

Nor is not mov'd with concord of sweet sounds, 

Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils. 

The Merchant of Venice.— Act V., Scene 1. 

Her voice was ever soft, 
Gentle, and low, an excellent thing in woman. 

King Lear.— Act V., Scene 3. 

She loved me for the dangers I had passed,. 
And I loved her that she did pity them. 

Othello— Act L, Scene 3. 

It is advised that the class should also read aloud the 
third act of Julius Gcesar. 



BACON. 

The following essay of Bacon illustrates several of the 
points mentioned on page 69. Let the pupil show which 
these are ; and let him consider whether this essay justifies 
Ben Jonson's estimate of Bacon. 

OF STUDIES. 

Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their 
chief use for delight, is in privateness and retiring ; for orna- 
ment, is in discourse ; and for ability, is in the judgment and 
disposition of business ; for expert men can execute, and perhaps 
judge of particulars one by one ; but the general counsels, and the 
plots and marshalling of affairs, come best from those that are 
learned. To spend too much time in studies, is sloth ; to use 
them too much for ornament, is affectation ; to make judgment 
wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar. They perfect 
nature, and are perfected by experience ; for natural abilities are 
like natural plants, that need pruning by study ; and studies 
themselves do give forth directions too much at large, except 
they be bounded in by experience, Crafty men contemn studies, 



254 SELECTIONS, 

simple men admire them, and wise men nse them ; for they teach 
not their own use ; but that is a wisdom without them and above 
them, won by observation. Read not to contradict and confute, 
nor to believe and take for granted, nor to find talk and dis- 
course, but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, 
others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested ; 
that is, some books are to be read only in parts ; others to be 
read, but not curiously ; and some few to be read wholly, and 
with diligence and attention. Some books also may be read by 
deputy, and extracts made of them by others ; but that would be 
only in the less important arguments and the meaner sort of 
books ; else distilled books are, like common distilled waters, 
flashy things. Reading maketh a full man ; conference a ready 
man ; and writing an exact man ; and, therefore, if a man write 
little, he had need have a great memory ; if he confer little, he 
had need have a present wit ; and if he read little, he had need 
have much cunning, to seem to know that he doth not. His- 
tories make men wise ; poets, witty ; the mathematics, subtile ; 
natural philosophy, deep ; moral, grave ; logic and rhetoric, able 
to contend : " Abeunt studia in mores ; " nay, there is no stand 
or impediment in the wit, but may be wrought out by fit studies. 
Like as diseases of the body may have appropriate exercises, 
bowling is good for the stone and reins, shooting for the lungs 
and breast, gentle walking for the stomach, riding for the head 
and the like ; so, if a man's wit be wandering, let him study the 
mathematics ; for in demonstrations, if his wit be called away 
never so little, he must begin again ; if his wit be not apt to dis- 
tinguish or find difference, let him study the schoolmen, for they 
are " Cymini sectores." If he be not apt to beat over matters, 
and to call up one thing to prove and illustrate another, let him 
study the lawyers' cases ; so every defect of the mind may have 
a special receipt. 



i 



MILTON. 255 



MILTON. 

On pages 78 and 79 some account is given of the com- 
panion poems, L' Allegro and II Penseroso. Let the pupil 
judge for himself whether these two pieces answer to the 
description there given. The most characteristic part of 
each poem is selected. 

L'ALLEGRO. 

Haste thee nymph, and bring with thee 
Jest and youthful Jollity, 
Quips and cranks, and wanton wiles, 
Nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles, 
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek, 
And love to live in dimple sleek; 
Sport that wrinkled Care derides, 
And Laughter holding both his sides. 
Come, and trip it as ye go 
On the light fantastic toe, 
And in thy right hand lead with thee 
The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty ; 
And if I give thee honour due, 
Mirth, admit me of thy crew, 
To live with her, and live with thee, 
In unreproved pleasures free ; 
To hear the lark begin his flight, 
And singing startle the dull night, 
From his watch-tow'r in the skies, 
Till the dappled dawn doth rise; 
Then to come in spite of sorrow, 
And at my window bid good morrow, 
Through the sweet-briar, or the vine, 
Or the twisted eglantine. 
While the cock with lively din, 
Scatters the rear of darkness thin, 
And to the stack, or the barn door, 
Stoutly struts his dames before: 
Oft list'ning how the hounds and horn 
Cheerly rouse the slumbring Morn, 



256 SELECTIONS. 

Frorn the side of some hoar hill, 

Through the high wood echoing shrill. 

Sometime walking not unseen 

By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green, 

Right against the eastern gate, 

Where the great Sun begins his state, 

Rob'd in flames, and amber light, 

The clouds in thousand liveries dight. 

While the ploughman near at hand, 

Whistles o'er the f urrow'd land, 

And the milkmaid singeth blithe, 

And the mower whets his sithe, 

And every shepherd tells his tale 

Under the hawthorn in the dale. 

Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures 

Whilst the landscape round it measures ; 

Russet lawns, and fallows gray, 

Where the nibbling flocks do stray, 

Mountains on whose barren breast 

The labouring clouds do often rest ; 

Meadows trim with daisies pied, 

Shallow brooks, and rivers wide. 

Towers, and battlements it sees 

Bosom'd high in tufted trees, 

Where perhaps some beauty lies, 

The Cynosure of neighbouring eyes. 

Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes, 

From betwixt two aged oaks ; 

Where Corydon and Thyrsis met, 

Are at their savoury dinner set 

Of herbs, and other country messes, 

Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses; 

And then in haste her bower she leaves, 

With Thestylis to bind the sheaves ; 

Or if the earlier season lead 

To the tann'd haycock in the mead. 

Sometimes with secure delight 

The upland hamlets wtfl invite ; 

When the merry bells ring round, 

And the jocund rebecks sound 



MILTON. 257 

To many a youth, and many a maid, 
Dancing in the chequer'd shade ; 
And young and old come forth to play 
On a sunshine holiday, 
Till the live-long day-light fail ; 
Then to the spicy nut-brown ale, 
With stories told of many a feat, 
How faery Mab the junkets eat; 
She was pincht and pull'd she sed ; 
And he by friars' lantern led, 
Tells how the drudging goblin sweat 
To earn his cream -bowl duly set ; 
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, 
His shadowy flail hath thresh'd the corn 
That ten day-labourers could not end. 
Then lies him down the lubbar fiend, 
And stretcht out all the chimney's length, 
Basks at the fire his hairy strength; 
And crop-full out of doors he flings, 
Ere the first cock his matin rings. 
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep, 
By whispering winds soon lull'd asleep. 

IL PENSEROSO. 

Come pensive Nun, devout and pure, 
Sober, stedfast, and demure, 
All in a robe of darkest grain, 
Flowing with majestic train, 
And sable stole of cipres lawn, 
Over thy decent shoulders drawn. 
Come, but keep thy wonted state, 
With ev'n step, and musing gait, 
And looks commercing with the skies, 
Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes : 
There held in holy passion still, 
Forget thyself to marble, till 
With a sad leaden downward cast, 
Thou fix them on the earth as fast. 
And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet, 
Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet, 



258 SELECTIONS. 

And hears the Muses in a ring, 

Aye round about Jove's altar sing. 

And add to these retired Leisure, 

That in trim gardens takes his pleasure; 

But first, and chiefest, with thee bring, 

Him that soars on golden wing, 

Guiding the fiery- wheeled throne, 

The cherub Contemplation, 

And the mute Silence hist along, 

'Less Philomel will deign a song, 

In her sweetest, saddest plight, 

Smoothing the rugged brow of Night, 

While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke, 

Gently o'er th' accustom'd oak : 

Sweet bird that shunn'st the noise of folly, 

Most musical, most melancholy ! 

Thee chauntress oft the woods among, 

I woo to hear thy even-song ; 

And missing thee, 1 walk unseen 

On the dry smooth-shaven green, 

To behold the wandring Moon, 

Riding near her highest noon, 

Like one that had been led astray 

Through the Heav'ns wide pathless way ; 

And oft, as if her head she bow'd, 

Stooping through a fleecy cloud. 

Oft on a plat of rising ground, 

I hear the far off curfeu sound, 

Over some wide- water' d shore, 

Swinging slow with sullen roar ; 

Or if the air will not permit, 

Some still removed place will fit, 

Where glowing embers through the room 

Teach light to counterfeit a gloom, 

Far from all resort of mirth, 

Save the cricket on the hearth, 

Or the bellman's drowsy charm, 

To bless the doors from nightly harm: 

Or let my lamp at midnight hour 

Be seen in some high lonely tow'r, 

Where I may oft out-watch the Bear. 






MILTON. 259 

The following passage from Paradise Lost describes the 
hosts of Satan, as he marshals them with "warlike sound 
of trumpets loud and clarions." The selection illustrates 
the power of imagination, the splendor of description, and 
matchless beauty of sound, that were Milton's greatest 
gifts. Here again is one of Milton's exquisite tributes to 
the influence of music. 

He his wonted pride 
Soon recollecting, with high words that bore 
Semblance of worth, not substance, gently rais'd 
Their fainting courage, and dispell'd their fears: 
Then straight commands that at the warlike sound 
Of trumpets loud and clarions be uprear'd 
His mighty standard ; that proud honour claim'd 
Azazel as his right, a Cherub tall ; 
Who forthwith from the glittering staff unfurl'd 
Th' imperial ensign, which full high advanc't 
Shon like a meteor streaming to the wind, 
With gems and golden lustre rich imblaz'd, 
Seraphic arms and trophies : all the while 
Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds: 
At which the universal host upsent 
A shout that tore Hell's concave, and beyond 
Frighted the reign of Chaos and old Night. 
All in a moment through the gloom were seen 
Ten thousand banners rise into the air 
With orient colours waving; with them rose 
A forest huge of spears ; and thronging helms 
Appear'd, and serried shields in thick array 
Of depth immeasurable; anon they move 
In perfect phalanx to the Dorian mood 
Of flutes and soft recorders ; such as rais'd 
To highth of noblest temper heroes old 
Arming to battle, and instead of rage 
Deliberate valour breath'd, firm and unmov'd 
With dread of death to flight or foul retreat ; 
Nor wanting power to mitigate and swage 
With solemn touches, troubl'd thoughts, and chase 
Anguish and doubt and fear and sorrow and pain 



260 SELECTIONS. 

From mortal or immortal minds. Thus they 
Breathing united force with fixed thought 
Mov'd on in silence, to soft pipes that charm'd 
Their painful steps o'er the burnt soil ; and now 
Advanc't in view, they stand, a horrid front 
Of dreadful length and dazzling arms, in guise 
Of warriors old with order'd spear and shield, 
Awaiting what command their mighty chief 
Had to impose : he through the armed files 
Darts his experienc't eye ; and soon traverse 
The whole battalion views, their ofder due, 
Their visages and stature as of gods, 
Their number last he sums. And now his heart 
Distends with pride, and hardning in his strength 
Glories : for never since created man, 
Met such imbodied force, as nam'd with these 
Could merit more than that small infantry 
Warr'd on by cranes. 

Satan has still enough nobility of soul to regret the ruin 
he has brought upon his followers, and to be touched 
by their loyalty. His character is nowhere so worthy of 
respect as at the moment when he addresses his hosts. 
" Their dread commander/'' 

Above the rest 
In shape and gesture proudly eminent 
Stood like a tow'r ; his form had yet not lost 
All her original brightness, nor appear'd 
Less than archangel ruin'd, and th' excess 
Of glory obscur'd : as when the sun new ris'n 
Looks through the horizontal misty air 
Shorn of his beams, or from behind the moon 
In dim eclipse disastrous twilight sheds 
On half the nations, and with fear of change 
Perplexes monarchs. Dark'n'd so, yet shon 
Above them all th' Archangel : but his face 
Deep scars of thunder had intrencht, and care 
Sat on his faded cheek, but under brows 
Of dauntless courage, and considerate pride 



MILT OK. 261 

Waiting revenge : cruel his eye, but cast 
Signs of remorse and passion to behold 
The fellows of his crime, the followers rather, 
(Far other once beheld in bliss) condemn'd 
For ever now to have their lot in pain, 
Millions of spirits for his fault amerc't 
Of Heav'n, and from eternal splendors flung 
For his revolt, yet faithful how they stood, 
Their glory wither'd. As when Heav'ns fire 
Hath scath'd the forest oaks, or mountain pines, 
With singed top their stately growth though bare 
Stands on the blasted heath. He now prepar'd 
To speak ; whereat their doubl'd ranks they bend 
From wing to wing, and half enclose him round 
With all his peers : attention held them mute. 
Thrice he assay'd, and thrice in spite of scorn, 
Tears such as angels weep, burst forth : at last 
Words interwove with sighs found out their way. 

The following soliloquy of the blind Samson Agonistes 
has a strong personal interest, since Milton wrote the poem 
when he himself was " blind among enemies/' As poetry, 
it is uneven in excellence, but its moral elevation is noble 
and impressive. The situation may be stated in Milton's 
own words : "Samson made captive, blind, and now in the 
prison at Gaza, there to labour as in a common workhouse, 
on a festival day, in the general cessation from labour, 
comes forth into the open air, to a place nigh, somewhat 
retired, there to sit awhile and bemoan his condition." 
The sixteenth chapter of Judges will further explain the 
situation. 

A little onward lend thy guiding hand 
To these dark steps, a little farther on ; 
For yonder bank hath choice of sun or shade : 
There I am wont to sit, when any chance 
Relieves me from my task of servile toil, 
Daily in the common prison else injoin'd me; 
Where I a prisoner chain'd, scarce freely draw 



262 SELECTIONS. 

The air imprison'd also, close and damp, 
Unwholesome draught: but here I feel amends, 
The breath of Heaven fresh blowing, pure and sweet, 
With day-spring born ; here leave me to respire. 
This day a solemn feast the people hold 
To Dagon their sea idol, and forbid 
Laborious works ; unwillingly this rest 
Their superstition yields me; hence with leave 
Retiring from the popular noise, I seek 
This unfrequented place to find some ease ; 
Ease to the body some, none to the mind 
From restless thoughts, that like a deadly swarm 
Of hornets arm'd, no sooner found alone, 
But rush upon me thronging, and present 
Times past, what once I was, and what am now. 
wherefore was my birth from heaven foretold 
Twice by an angel, who at last in sight 
Of both my parents all in flames ascended 
From off the altar, where an off'ring burn'd, 
As in a fiery column charioting 
His god-like presence, and from some great act 
Or benefit reveal'd to Abraham's race? 
Why was my breeding order'd and prescrib'd 
As of a person separate to God, 
Design'd for great exploits ; if I must die 
Betray'd, captiv'd, and both my eyes put out, 
Made of my enemies the scorn and gaze; 
To grind in brazen fetters under task 
With this Heaven-gifted strength? glorious strength 
Put to the labour of a beast, debas't 
Lower than bondslave ! Promise was that I 
v Should Israel from Philistian yoke deliver ; 
Ask for this great deliverer now, and find him 
Eyeless in Gaza at the mill with slaves, 
Himself in bonds under Philistian yoke ; 
Yet stay, let me not rashly call in doubt 
Divine prediction ; what if all foretold 
Had been fulfill'd but through mine own default, 
Whom have I to complain of but myself? 
Who this high gift of strength committed to me, 
In what part lodg'd, how easily bereft me, 



MILTON. 263 

Under the seal of silence could not keep, 

But weakly to a woman must reveal it, 

O'ercome with importunity and tears. 

impotence of mind, in body strong ! 

But what is strength, without a double share 

Of wisdom? vast, unwieldy, burdensome, 

Proudly secure, yet liable to fall 

By weakest subtleties ; not made to rule, 

But to subserve where wisdom bears command. 

God, when he gave me strength, to show withal 

How slight the gift was, hung it in my hair. 

But peace ; I must not quarrel with the will 

Of highest dispensation, which herein 

Haply had ends above my reach to know : 

Suffices that to me strength is my bane. 

And proves the source of all my miseries ; 

So many, and so huge, that each apart 

Would ask a life to wail ; but chief of all, 

loss of sight, of thee I most complain ! 

Blind among enemies, worse than chains, 

Dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age ! 

Light the prime work of God to me is extinct, 

And all her various objects of delight 

Annull'd, which might in part my grief have eas'd 

Inferior to the vilest now become 

Of man or worm; the vilest here excel me, 

They creep, yet see ; I dark in light, expos'd 

To daily fraud, contempt, abuse and wrong, 

Within doors, or without, still as a fool, 

In power of others, never in my own ; 

Scarce half I seem to live, dead more than half. 

dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon, 

Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse 

Without all hope of day ! 

first created beam, and thou great Word, 

' Let there be light,' and light was over all ; 

Why am I thus bereav'd thy prime decree? 

The sun to me is dark 

And silent as the moon, 

When she deserts the night, 

Hid in her vacant interlunar cave. 



264 SELECTIONS. 

Since light so necessary is to life, 

And almost life itself, if it be true 

That light is in the soul, 

She all in every part ; why was the sight 

To such a tender ball as th' eye confin'd, 

So obvious and so easy to be quench't ? 

And not, as feeling, through all parts diffus'd, 

That she might look at will through every pore? 

Then had I not been thus exil'd from light ; 

As in the land of darkness, yet in light 

To live a life half dead, a living death, 

And buried ; but (0 yet more miserable !) 

Myself my sepulchre, a moving grave. 

Buried, yet not exempt 

By privilege of death and burial 

From worst of other evils, pains and wrongs; 

But made hereby obnoxious more 

To all the miseries of life, 

Life in captivity 

Among inhuman foes. 

But who are these? for with joint pace I hear 

The tread of many feet steering this way ; 

Perhaps my enemies who come to stare 

At my affliction, and perhaps t' insult, 

Their daily practice to afflict me more. 

Milton's prose writings have a single aim, the promotion 
of liberty. At one time he defends religions liberty ; at 
another, the liberty of the citizen ; and again, the domestic 
freedom of husband and wife. In the Areopagitica, he 
pleads for liberty in another direction. In 1643, Parlia- 
ment had ordered that no books should be issued without 
a rigid inspection by certain officers of the law, who were 
to seize and destroy any piece of writing tending to the 
"defamation of Religion and government." Milton saw 
in this measure great danger to the freedom of speech that 
he and all wise men recognize as so necessary to the safety 
of a people. " Lastly/' he says, " I wrote my Areopagitica 
in order to deliver the press from the restraints with which 



MILTON. 265 

it was encumbered ; that the power of determining what 
was true and what was false, what ought to be published 
and what to be suppressed, might no longer be entrusted 
to a few illiterate and illiberal individuals, who refused 
their sanction to any work which contained views or senti- 
ments at all above the level of the vulgar superstition." 
The Areojxcgitica is an example of the impassioned, imag- 
inative prose of Milton. The structure of his sentence 
differs much from the modern sentence of a writer like 
Macaulay. One sonorous clause rolls on after another, till 
a long and involved, but often majestic and thrilling, sen- 
tence is the result. As an argumentative writer, Milton is 
not calm and lucid, asjwe now expect such a writer to be-; 
he kindles and excites his reader rather like a poet than 
like a reasoner. Consider whether this be true of the two 
passages that follow. 

I deny not but that it is of greatest concernment in the Church 
and Commonwealth, to have a vigilant eye how Bookes demeane 
themselves as well as men ; and thereafter to confine, imprison, 
and do sharpest justice on them as malefactors : For Books are 
not absolutely dead things, but doe contain a potencie of life in 
them to be as active as that soule was whose progeny they are ; 
nay, they do preserve as in a violl the purest efficacie and extrac- 
tion of that living intellect that bred them. I know they are as 
lively, and as vigorously productive, as those fabulous Dragons 
teeth ; and being sown up and down, may chance to spring up 
armed men. And yet on the other hand, unlesse warinesse be 
us'd, as good almost kill a Man as kill a good Book ; who kills a 
Man kills a reasonable creature, Gods Image ; but hee who de- 
stroyes a good Booke, kills reason it selfe, kills the Image of God 
as it were in the eye Many a man lives a burden to the Earth ; 
but a good Booke is the pretious life-blood of a master spirit, im- 
balm'd and treasur'd up on purpose to a life beyond life. Tis 
true, no age can restore a life, whereof perhaps there is no great 
losse ; and revolutions of ages doe not oft recover the losse of a 
rejected truth, for- the want of which whole Nations fare the 



266 SELECTIONS. 

worse. We should be wary therefore what persecution we raise 
against the living labours of publick men, how we spill that sea- 
son'd life of man preserv'd and stor'd up in Books ; since we see 
a kinde of homicide may be thus committed, sometimes a martyr- 
dome, and if it extend to the whole impression, a kinde of mas- 
sacre, whereof the execution ends not in the slaying of an ele- 
mentall life, but strikes at that ethereall and fift essence, the 
breath of reason it selfe, slaies an immortality rather then a life. 
But lest I should be condemn'd of introducing licence, while I op- 
pose Licencing, I refuse not the paines to be so much Historicall 
as will serve to shew what hath been done by ancient and famous 
Commonwealths against this disorder, till the very time that this 
project of licencing crept out of the Inquisition, was catcht up by 
pur Prelates, and hath caught some of our Presbyters. 

If therefore ye be loath to dishearten utterly and discontent, 
not the mercenary crew of false pretenders to learning, but the 
free and ingenuous sort of such as evidently were born to study 
and love lerning for it self, not for lucre or any other end but the 
service of God and of truth, and perhaps that lasting fame and per- 
petuity of praise which God and good men have consented shall 
be the reward of those whose publisht labours advance the good 
of mankind, then know, that so far to distrust the judgement 
and the honesty of one who hath but a common repute in learn- 
ing and never yet offended, as not to count him fit to print his 
mind without a tutor and examiner, lest he should drop a seism 
or something of corruption, is the greatest displeasure and indig- 
nity to a free and knowing spirit that can be put upon him. 
What advantage is it to be a man over it is to be a boy at school, 
if we have only scapt the ferular to come under the fescu of an 
Imprimatur ? if serious and elaborat writings, as if they were no 
more then the theam of a Grammar lad under his Pedagogue 
must not be utter'd without the cursory eyes of a temporizing 
and extemporizing licencer ? He who is not trusted with his own 
actions, his drift not being known to be evill, and standing to the 
hazard of law and penalty, has no great argument to think him- 
self reputed in the Commonwealth wherein he was born for other 
then a fool or a foreiner. When a man writes to the world, he 
summons up all his reason and deliberation to assist him ; he 



BUNYAN. 267 

searches, meditats, is industrious, and likely consults and con- 
ferrs with his judicions friends ; after all which done he takes 
himself to be inform'd in what he writes as well. as any that writ 
before hirn ; if in this the most consummat act of his fidelity and 
ripenesse, no years, no industry, no former proof of his abilities 
can bring him to that state of maturity as not to be still mis- 
trusted and suspected, unlesse he carry all his considerat dili- 
gence, all his midnight watchings, and expence of Palladian oyl, 
to the hasty view of an unleasur'd licencer, perhaps much his 
younger, perhaps far his inferiour in judgement, perhaps one 
who never knew the labour of book-writing, and if he be not 
repulst or slighted, must appear in Print like a punie with his 
guardian and his censors hand on the back of his title to be his 
bayl and surety, that he is no idiot or seducer, it cannot be but a 
dishonor and derogation to the author, to the book, to the privi- 
ledge and dignity of Learning. 



BUNYAN. 

Christian and Faithful, in their journey from the City 
of Destruction to the New Jerusalem, are obliged to pass 
through Vanity Fair ; that is, they encounter the tempta- 
tions of worldliness in every form. Bunyan gives an ac- 
count of this thoughtless community, with its whole heart 
set on the things of this world. The frequenters of Vanity 
Fair and the two pilgrims to the New Jerusalem recognize 
at once their uncongeniality: "They seemed barbarians each 
to the other/'' The dress, the speech, the un worldliness of 
the pilgrims gave great offense, till at last they were con- 
fined as madmen. 

Let the pupil follow out Bunyan's meaning through the 
details of the story. Why did Thackeray name his famous 
novel Vanity Fair? 

Then I saw in my dream, that when they were got out of the 
wilderness, they presently saw a town before them, and the name 



268 SELECTIONS. 

of that town is Vanity ; and at the town there is a fair kept, 
called Vanity Fair. It is kept all the year long. It beareth the 
name of Vanity Fair, because the town where it is kept is lighter 
than vanity ; and also, because all that is there sold, or that 
cometh thither, is vanity, as is the saying of the wise, All that 
cometh is vanity. 

This fair is no new-erected business, but a thing of ancient 
standing. I will show you the original of it. 

Almost five thousand"years ago there were pilgrims walking to 
the Celestial City, as these two honest persons are ; and Beelzebub, 
Apollyon, and Legion, with their companions, perceiving by the 
path that the pilgrims made, that their way to the city lay through 
this town of Vanity, they contrived here to set up a fair ; a fair 
wherein should be sold all sorts of vanity, and that it should last 
all the year long. Therefore at this fair are all such merchandise 
sold as houses, lands, trades, places, honours, preferments, titles, 
countries, kingdoms, lusts, pleasures ; and delights of all sorts, 
as wives, husbands, children, masters, servants, lives, blood, 
bodies, souls, silver, gold, pearls, precious stones, and what not. 

And moreover, at this fair there is at all times to be seen jug- 
glings, cheats, games, plays, fools, apes, knaves, and rogues, and 
that of every kind. 

Here are to be seen, too, and that for nothing, thefts, murders, 
false swearers, and that of a blood-red colour. 

And as, in other fairs of less moment, there are the several rows 
and streets under their proper names, where such and such wares 
are vended ; so here likewise you have the proper places, rows, 
streets, (namely, countries and kingdoms,) where the wares of this 
fair are soonest to be found. Here is the Britain Kow, the French 
Row, the Italian Row, the Spanish Row, the G-erman Row, where 
several sorts of vanities are to be sold. But as in other fairs some 
one commodity is the chief of all the fair, so the ware of Rome 
and her merchandise is greatly promoted in this fair ; only our 
English nation, with some others, have taken a dislike thereat. 

Now, as I said, the way to the Celestial City lies just through 
this town where this lusty fair is kept ; and he that would go to 
the city, and yet not go through this town, must needs go out of 
the world. 

* ******** 



BUN YAK. 269 

Now these pilgrims, as I said, must needs go through this fair. 
Well, so they did ; but, behold, even as they entered into the 
fair, all the people in the fair were moved, and the town itself, 
as it were, in a hubbub about them, and that for several reasons : 
For, 

First, The pilgrims were clothed with such kind of raiment as 
was diverse from the raiment of any that traded in that fair. 
The people, therefore, of the fair made a great gazing upon 
them ; some said they were fools ; some they were bedlams ; and 
some they were outlandish men. 

Secondly, And as they wondered at their apparel, so they did 
likewise at their speech ; for few could understand what they 
said. They naturally spoke the language of Canaan ; but they 
that kept the fair were the men of this world. So that from one 
end of the fair to the other, they seemed barbarians each to the 
other. 

Thirdly, But that which did not a little amuse the merchan- 
dizers was, that these pilgrims set very light by all their wares. 
They cared not so much as to look upon them ; and if they called 
upon them to buy, they would put their fingers in their ears, and 
cry, Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity, and look 
upward, signifying that their trade and traffic was in heaven. 

One chanced mockingly, beholding the carriage of the men, to 
say unto them, What will ye buy ? But they, looking gravely 
upon him, said, We buy the truth. At that, there was an occa- 
sion taken to despise the men the more ; some mocking, some 
taunting, some speaking reproachfully, and some calling upon 
others to smite them. At last things came to a hubbub, and 
great stir in the fair, insomuch that all order was confounded. 
Now was word presently brought to the great one of the fair, 
who quickly came down and deputed some of his most trusty 
friends to take those men into examination, about whom the 
fair was almost overturned. So the men were brought to 
examination ; and they that sat upon them asked whence they 
came, whither they went, and what they did there in such an 
unusual garb. The men told them that they were pilgrims and 
strangers in the world, and that they were going to their own 
country, which was the heavenly Jerusalem ; and that they had 
given no occasion to the men of the town, nor yet to the mer- 



270 SELECTIONS. 

chandizers, thus to abuse them, aud to let them in their journey, 
except it was for that, when one asked them what they would 
buy, they said they would buy the truth. But they that were 
appointed to examine them, did not believe them to be any 
other than bedlams and mad, or else such as came to put all 
things into a confusion in the fair. Therefore they took them 
and beat them, and besmeared them with dirt, and then put them 
into the cage, that they might be made a spectacle to all the men 
of the fair. 

The next passage from Pilgrim's Progress shows Chris- 
tian near the end of life. His trials and temptations lie 
behind him, and he rests at the close in joy and peace, 
with his eyes fixed upon the Celestial City, in sight 
at last. 

Now I saw in my dream, that by this time the pilgrims were 
got over the Enchanted Ground, and entering into the country 
of Beulah, whose air was very sweet and pleasant ; the way 
lying directly through it, they solaced themselves there for a 
season. Yea, here they heard continually the singing of birds, 
and saw every day the flowers appear in the earth, and heard 
the voice of the turtle in the land. In this country the sun 
shineth night and day : wherefore this was beyond the Valley 
of the Shadow of Death, and also out of the reach of Giant 
Despair ; neither could they from this place so much as see 
Doubting-castle. Here they were within sight of the City they 
were going to : also here met them some of the inhabitants 
thereof ; for in this land the shining ones commonly walked, be- 
cause it was upon the borders of heaven. In this land also the 
contract between the Bride and the Bridegroom was renewed ; 
yea, here as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so doth 
their God rejoice over them. Here they had no want of corn 
and wine ; for in this place they met with abundance of what 
they had sought for in all their pilgrimages. Here they heard 
voices from out of the City, loud voices, saying, Say ye to the 
daughters of Zion, Behold, thy salvation cometh ! Behold, his 
reward is with him ! Here all the inhabitants of the country 






BUN Y AN. 271 

called them the holy people, the redeemed of the Lord, sought 
out, &c. 

Now, as they walked in this land, they had more rejoicing than 
in parts more remote from the kingdom to which they were bound; 
and drawing near to the City, they had yet a more perfect view 
thereof. It was builded of pearls and precious stones, also the 
streets thereof were paved with gold ; so that, by reason of the 
natural glory of the City, and the reflection of the sunbeams upon 
it, Christian with desire fell sick ; Hopeful also had a fit or two 
of the same disease : wherefore here they lay by it awhile, crying 
out because of their pangs, If you see my Beloved, tell him that 
I am sick of love. 

But, being a little strengthened, and better able to bear their 
sickness, they walked on^ their way, and came yet nearer and 
nearer, where were orchards, vineyards, and gardens, and their 
gates opened into the highway. Now, as they came up to these 
places, behold the gardener stood in the way ; to whom the pil- 
grims said, Whose goodly vineyards and gardens are these ? 
He answered, They are the King's, and are planted here for his 
own delights, and also for the solace of pilgrims. So the gar- 
dener had them into the vineyards, and bid them refresh them- 
selves with the dainties ; he also showed them there the King's 
walks and the arbours, where he delighteth to be : and here they 
tarried and slept. 

The death of Christian is figured as the crossing of a 
deep river. On the other shore the pilgrims are met by 
two Shining Ones. 

Now you must note, that the City stood upon a mighty hill ; 
but the pilgrims went up that hill with ease, because they had 
these two men to lead them up by the arms ; they had likewise 
left their mortal garments behind them in the river ; for though 
they went in with them, they came out without them. They 
therefore went up here with much agility and speed, though the 
foundation upon which the City was framed was higher than the 
clouds ; they therefore went up through the regions of the air, 
sweetly talking as they went, being comforted because they safely 



2TZ SELECTIONS. 

got over the river, and had such glorious companions to attend 
them. 

The talk that they had with the shining ones was about the glory 
of the place ; who told them that the beauty and glory of it was 
inexpressible. There, said they, is the Mount Sion, the heav- 
enly Jerusalem, the innumerable company of angels, and the 
spirits of just men made perfect. You are going now, said 
they, to the paradise of God, wherein you shall see the tree of 
life, and eat of the never-fading fruits thereof : and when you 
come there you shall have white robes given you, and your 
walk and talk shall be every day with the King, even all the 
days of eternity. There you shall not see again such things 
as you saw when you were in the lower region upon the earth ; 
to wit, sorrow, sickness, affliction, and death ; For the former 
things are passed away. 

********* 

Now while they were thus drawing toward the gate, behold a 
company of the heavenly host came out to meet them ; to whom 
it was said by the other two shining ones, These are the men 
that have loved our Lord, when they were in the world, and that 
have left all for his holy name ; and he hath sent us to fetch them, 
and we have brought them thus far on their desired journey, that 
they may go in and look their Kedeemer in the face with joy. 
Then the heavenly host gave a great shout, saying, Blessed are 
they that are called to the marriage-supper of the Lamb. There 
came out also at this time to meet them several of the King's 
trumpeters, clothed in white and shining raiment, who with 
melodious voices and loud made even the heavens to echo with 
their sound. Those trumpeters saluted Christian and his fel- 
low with ten thousand welcomes from the world ; and this 
they did with shouting and sound of trumpet. 

This done, they compassed them round on every side ; some 
went before, some behind, and some on the right hand, and some 
on the left, (as it were to guard them through the upper regions,) 
continually sounding as they went, with melodious noise, in notes 
on high : so that the very sight was to them that could behold it 
as if heaven itself was come down to meet them. Thus therefore 
they walked on together ; and, as they walked, ever and anon 



DKTDEN. 273 

these trumpeters, even with joyful sound, would, by mixing their 
music with looks and gestures, still signify to Christian and his 
brother how welcome they were into their company, and with 
what gladness they came to meet them. And now were these two 
men, as it were, in heaven, before they came at it, being swal- 
lowed up with the sight of angels, and with hearing their melo- 
dious notes. Here also they had the City itself in view ; and 
they thought they heard all the bells therein to ring, to welcome 
them thereto. But, above all, the warm and joyful thoughts 
that they had about their own dwelling there with such company, 
and that for ever and ever, O, by what tongue or pen can their 
glorious joy be expressed ! 

DRYDEN. 

The following ode is less famous than Alexander's Feast, 
but it is a poem of more meaning and beauty. 

A SONG FOR ST. CECILIA'S DAY, 1687. 
I. 

From harmony, from heavenly harmony 

This universal frame began ; 
When nature underneath a heap 

Of jarring atoms lay, 
And could not heave her head, 
The tuneful voice was heard from high, 

Arise, ye more than dead. 
Then cold, and hot, and moist, and dry, 
In order to their stations leap, 

And Music's power obey. 
From harmony, from heavenly harmony 

This universal frame began: 

From harmony to harmony 
Through all the compass of the notes it ran, 
The diapason closing full in Man. 

II. 

What passion cannot Music raise and quell? 
When Jubai struck the corded shell* 



274 SELECTIONS. 

His listening brethren stood around, 
And, wondering, on their faces fell 
To worship that celestial sound. 
Less than a God they thought there could not dwell 
Within the hollow of that shell, 
That spoke so sweetly and so well. 
What passion cannot Music raise and quell? 

III. 

The trumpet's loud clangor 

Excites us to arms, 
With shrill notes of anger, 

And mortal alarms. 
The double double double beat 
Of the thundering drum 
Cries, hark ! the foes come ; 
Charge, Charge, 'tis too late to retreat. 

IV. 

The soft complaining flute 
In dying notes discovers 
The woes of hopeless lovers, 
Whose dirge is whisper'd by the warbling lute. 



Sharp violins proclaim 
Their jealous pangs, and desperation, 
Fury, frantic indignation, 
Depth of pains, and height of passion, 

For the fair, disdainful dame. 

VI. 

But oh ! what art can teach, 

What human voice can reach, 

The sacred organ's praise? 

Notes inspiring holy love, 

Notes that wing their heavenly ways 
To mend the choirs above. 



DRTDEN. 275 



VII. 



Orpheus could lead the savage race ; 
And trees uprooted left their place, 

Sequacious of the lyre : 
But bright Cecilia rais'd the wonder higher : 
When to her organ vocal breath was given, 
An angel heard, and straight appear'd 

Mistaking earth for heaven. 

GRAND CHORUS. 

As from the power of sacred lays 

The spheres began to move, 
And sung the great Creator's praise 

To all the ; bless'd above ; 
So when the last and dreadful hour 
This crumbling pageant shall devour, 
The trumpet shall be heard on high, 
The dead shall live, the living die, 
And Music shall untune the sky. 

The strength and ease of Dryden, 

"The varying verse, the full- resounding line, 
The long majestic march, and energy divine," 

are never more marked than in his translations. His ver- 
sions are bold and free, careless of the letter and of the 
spirit of the original ; but the flow and energy of the verse 
are undeniable. 

The following passage from Virgil's JEneid will be famil- 
iar to many pupils who have read it in the original. The 
Trojans, on their way to Italy, are overtaken by a storm, 
which iEolus raises at the request of Juno. 

Thus rag'd the goddess ; and with fury fraught, 
The restless regions of the storms she sought, 
Where, in a spacious cave of living stone, 
The tyrant iEolus, from his airy throne, 



276 SELECTIONS. 

With pow'r imperial curbs the struggling winds, 
And sounding tempests in dark prisons binds. 
This way, and that, th' impatient captives tend, 
And, pressing for release, the mountains rend. 
High in his hall th' undaunted monarch stands, 
And shakes his sceptre, and their rage commands ; 
Which did he not, their unresisted sway- 
Would sweep the word before them in their way ; 
Earth, air, and seas, through empty space would roll, 
And heav'n would fly before the driving soul. 
In fear of this, the father of the gods 
Confin'd their fury to those dark abodes, 
And lock'd them safe within, oppress'd with mountain loads 
Impos'd a king with arbitrary sway, 
To loose their fetters, or their force allay ; 
To whom the suppliant queen her pray'rs address'd, 
And thus the tenor of her suit express'd, 

" 0, iEolus! — for to thee the king of heav'n 
The pow'r of tempests and of winds has giv'n ; 
Thy force alone their fury can restrain, 
And smooth the waves, or swell the troubled main — 
A race of wand'ring slaves, abhorr'd by me, 
With prosp'rous passage cut the Tuscan sea: 
To fruitful Italy their course they steer, 
And, for their vanquish'd gods, design new temples there. 
Raise all thy winds, with night involve the skies ; 
Sink or disperse my fatal enemies. 
Twice sev'n, the charming daughters of the main, 
'Around my person wait, and bear my train : ' 
Succeed my wish, and second my design, 
The fairest, Deiopeia, shall be thine, 
And make thee father of a happy line." 

To this the god — " 'T is yours, queen! to will 
The work, which duty binds me to fulfil. 
These airy kingdoms, and this wide command, 
Are all the presents of your bounteous hand : 
Yours is my sov'reign's grace ; and, as your guest, 
I sit with gods at their celestial feast. 
Raise tempests at your pleasure, or subdue ; 
Dispose of empire, which I hold from you," 



DR1DEK. 277 

He said, and hurPd against the mountain side 
His quiv'ring spear, and all the god applied. 
The raging winds rush through the hollow wound, 
And dance aloft in air, and skim along the ground; 
Then settling on the sea,, the surges sweep, 
Raise liquid mountains, and disclose the deep ; 
South, east, and west, with mix'd confusion roar, 
And roll the foaming billows to the shore. 
The cables crack ; the sailors' fearful cries 
Ascend ; and sable night involves the skies; 
And heav'n itself is ravish'd from their eyes. 
Loud peals of thunder from the poles ensue ; 
Then flashing fires the transient light renew, 
The face of things a frightful image bears ; 
And present death in various forms appears. 
Struck with unusual fright, the Trojan chief, 
With lifted hands and eyes, invokes relief. 



Meantime imperial Neptune heard the sound 
Of raging billows breaking on the ground. 
Displeas'd, and fearing for his wat'ry reign, 
He rear'd his awful head above the main 
Serene in majesty, — then roll'd his eyes 
Around the space of earth, and seas, and skies. 
He saw the Trojan fleet dispers'd, distress'd, 
By stormy winds and wint'ry heav'n oppress'd. 
Full well the god his sister's envy knew, 
And what her aims, and what her arts pursue. 
He summon'd Eurus and the Western blast, 
And first an angry glance on both he cast, 
Then thus rebuk'd — " Audacious winds! from whence 
This bold attempt, this rebel insolence ! 
Is it for you to ravage seas and land, 
Unauthoriz'd by my supreme command? 
To raise such mountains on the troubled main? 
Whom I — but first 't is fit the billows to restrain: 
And then you shall be taught obedience to my reign. 
Hence, to your lord my royal mandate bear — 
The realms of ocean and the fields of air 



278 SELECTIONS. 

Are mine, not his. By fatal lot to me 

The liquid empire fell, and trident of the sea. 

His pow'r to hollow caverns is eonfin'd : 

There let him reign, the jailer of the wind ; 

With hoarse commands his breathing subjects call, 

And boast and bluster in his empty hall." 

He spoke and while he spoke he smooth'd the sea, 

Dispell'd the darkness and restor'd the day. 

Cymothoe, Triton, and the sea-green train 

Of beauteous nymphs, the daughters of the main, > 

Clear from the rocks the vessels with their hands : 

The god himself with ready trident stands, 

And opes the deep, and spreads the moving sands ; 

Then heaves them off the shoals. — Where'er he guides 

His finny coursers, and in triumph rides, 

The waves unruffie, and the sea subsides. 

As when in tumults rise th' ignoble crowd, 

Mad are their motions, and their tongues are loud ; 

And stones and brands in rattling volleys fly, 

And all the rustic arms that fury can supply ; 

If then some grave and pious man appear, 

They hush their noise, and lend a list'ning ear: 

He sooths with sober words their angry mood, 

And quenches their innate desire of blood : 

So, when the father of the flood appears, 

And o'er the seas his sov'reign trident rears, 

Their fury falls: he skims the liquid plains, 

High on his chariot, and, with loosen'd reins, 

Majestic moves along, and awful peace maintains. 



On page 100 mention was made of the merits of Dryden's 
prose. The following extracts are from the preface to his 
modernized versions of Chaucer. He declares that Chau- 
cer's language "is so obsolete that his sense is scarce to be 
understood," and announces his intention of "turning 
some of the Canterbury Tales into our language, as it is 
now refined." The wonder is, in Dryden's age, not that 
he thought Chaucer obsolete, but that he was bold enough 
to attempt a revival of interest in Chaucer's poetry and 



DRTDEK. 279 

to stamp it with his own high approval. His admiration is 
hearty, and is expressed in manly English that has the 
ease and energy of good talk. We may often disagree 
with Dryden's views, but his way of putting them is 
suggestive and agreeable. 

In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, so I 
hold him in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held 
Homer or the Eomans Virgil : he is a perpetual fountain of good 
sense, learned in all sciences, and therefore speaks properly on 
all subjects : as he knew what to say, so he knows also when to 
leave off, a continence which is practised by few writers, and 
scarcely by any of the ancients, excepting Virgil and Horace. 

Chaucer followed nature everywhere, but was never so bold to 
go beyond her; and there is a great difference of being Poeta and 
nimis Poeta, if we believe Catullus, as much as betwixt a modest 
behaviour and affectation. The verse of Chaucer, I confess, is 
not harmonious to us ; they who lived with him, and some time 
after him, thought it musical ; and it continues so even in our 
judgment, if compared with the numbers of Lidgate and Gower, 
his contemporaries : there is the rude sweetness of a Scotch tune 
in it, which is natural and pleasing, though not perfect. It is 
true, I cannot go so far as he who published the last edition of 
him; for he would make us believe the fault is in our ears, and 
that there were really ten syllables in a verse where we find but 
nine : but this opinion is not worth confuting. 

We can only say, that he lived in the infancy of our poetry, 
and that nothing is brought to perfection at the first. We must 
be children before we grow men. There was an Ennius, and in 
process of time a Lucilius, and a Lucretius, before Virgil and 
Horace ; even after Chaucer there was a Spenser, a Harrington, 
a Fairfax, before Waller and Denham were in being : and our 
numbers were in their nonage till these last appeared. 

As for the religion of our poet, he seems to have some little 
bias towards the opinions of Wickliff, after John of Gaunt his 



280 SELECTIONS. 

patron ; somewhat of which appears in the tale of Piers Plow- 
man: yet I cannot blame him for inveighing so sharply against 
the vices of the clergy in his age ; their pride, their ambition, 
their pomp, their avarice, their worldly interest, deserved the 
lashes which he gave them, both in that and in most of his Can- 
terbury tales : neither has his contemporary Boccace spared them. 
Yet both these poets lived in much esteem with good and holy 
men in orders ; for the scandal which is given by particular 
priests, reflects not on the sacred function. Chaucer's Monk, his 
Chanon, and his Fryer, took not from the character of his Good 
Parson. A satyrical poet is the check of the laymen on bad 
priests. 

In the mean while. I take up Chaucer where I left him. He 
must have been a man of a most wonderful comprehensive nature, 
because, as it has been truly observed of him, he has taken into 
the compass of his Canterbury tales the various manners and 
humours (as we now call them) of the whole English nation, in 
his age. Not a single character has escaped him. All his pil- 
grims are severally distinguished from each other; and not only 
in their inclinations, but in their very physiognomies and per- 
sons. Baptista Porta could not have described their natures 
better, than by the marks which the poet gives them. The mat- 
ter and manner of their tales, and of their telling, are so suited 
to their different educations, humours, and callings, that each of 
them would be improper in any other mouth. Even the grave 
and serious characters are distinguished by their several sorts of 
gravity: their discourses are such as belong to their age, their 
calling, and their breeding ; such as are becoming of them, and 
of them only. Some of his persons are vicious, and some virtu- 
ous ; some are unlearned, or (as Chaucer calls them) lewd, and 
some are learned. Even the ribaldry of the low characters is dif- 
ferent: the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook, are several men, and 
distinguished from each other, as much as the mincing lady pri- 
oress, and the broad-speaking gap-toothed wife of Bath. But 
enough of this: there is such a variety of game springing up be- 
fore me, that I am distracted in my choice, and know not which 
to follow. 'Tis sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that 
here is God's plenty. We have our forefathers and great gran- 



D H Y t> E K . 281 

dames all before us, as they were in Chaucer's days; their general 
characters are still remaining in mankind, and even in England, 
though they are called by other names than those of Monks and 
Friars, and Chanons, and lady Abbesses, and Nuns: for mankind 
is ever the same, and nothing lost out of nature, though every 
thing is altered. 

I have almost done with Chaucer, when I have answered some 
objections relating to my present work. I find some people are 
offended that I have turned these tales into modern English ; be- 
cause they think them unworthy of my pains, and look on Chau- 
cer as a dry, old-fashioned wit, not worth reviving. I have often 
heard the late Earl of Leicester say, that Mr. Cowley himself was 
of that opinion ; who having read him over at my lord's request, 
declared he had no taste of him. I dare not advance my opinion 
against the judgement of so great an author ; but I think it fair, 
however, to leave the decision to the public: Mr. Cowley was too 
modest to set up for a dictator ; and being shocked perhaps with 
his old style, never examined into the depth of his good sense. 
Chaucer, I confess, is a rough diamond, and must first be pol- 
ished, ere he shines. I deny not, likewise, that, living in our 
early days of poetry, he writes not always of a piece ; but some- 
times mingles trivial things with those of greater moment. Some- 
times, also, though not often, he runs riot, like Ovid, and knows 
not when he has said enough. But there are more great wits be- 
sides Chaucer, whose fault is their excess of conceits, and those 
ill sorted. An author is not to write all he can, but only all he 
ought. Having observed this redundancy in Chaucer, (as it is an 
easy matter for a man of ordinary parts to find a fault in one of 
greater,) I have not tied myself to a literal translation; but have 
often omitted what I judged unnecessary, or not of dignity enough 
to appear in the company of better thoughts. I have presumed 
farther, in some places, and added somewhat of my own where I 
thought my author was deficient, and had not given his thoughts 
their true lustre, for want of words in the beginning of our lan- 
guage. And to this I was the more emboldened, because (if I 
may be permitted to say it of myself) I found I had a soul con- 
genial to his, and that I had been conversant in the same studies. 
Another poet, in another age, may take the same liberty with 



282 SELECTIONS. 

my writings ; if at least they live long enough to deserve cor- 
rection. 



The following passage of Dryden is from his Essay of 
Dramatick Poesie, which Dr. Johnson called "the first 
regular and valuable treatise on the art of writing/' as 
he calls Dryden "the father of English criticism." The 
estimate of Shakespeare here given is praised highly by 
Johnson, who declares it "a perpetual model of encomi- 
astick criticism," and further says that admirers of Shake- 
speare have hardly done much more than diffuse and para- 
phrase "this epitome of excellence." 

To begin then with Shakespeare ; he was the man, who of all 
modern, and perhaps ancient poets, had the largest and most 
comprehensive soul. All the images of nature were still present 
to him, and he drew them not laboriously, but luckily. When he 
describes anything, you more than see it, you feel it too. Those 
who accuse him to have wanted learning, give him the greater 
commendation. He was naturally learned; he needed not the 
spectacles of books to read nature: he looked inwards and found 
her there. I cannot say he is everywhere alike ; were he so, I 
should do him injury to compare him with the greatest of man- 
kind. He is many times flat, insipid; his comick wit degenerat- 
ing into clenches, his serious swelling into bombast. But he is 
always great, when some great occasion is presented to him : no 
man can say he ever had a fit subject for his wit, and did not 
then raise himself high above the rest of poets. The considera- 
tion of this made Mr. Hales of Eaton say, that there was no sub- 
ject of which any poet ever writ, but he would produce it much 
better treated of in Shakespeare ; and however others are now 
generally preferred before him, yet the age wherein he lived, 
which had contemporaries with him, Fletcher and Johnson, never 
equalled them to him in their esteem; and in the last king's court, 
when Ben's reputation was at highest, Sir John Suckling, and 
with him the greater part of the courtiers, set our Shakespeare 
above him. 



pope. 283 



POPE. 

The qualities of Pope that have been mentioned, are 
most of them illustrated in his famous Epistle to Dr. 
Arbuthnot. He complains here loudly of the bores who 
intrude upon his privacy at Twickenham. 

Is there a parson, much bemused in beer, 
A maudlin poetess, a rhyming peer, 
A clerk, foredoomed his father's soul to cross, 
Who pens a stanza, when he should engross? 
Is there, who, locked from ink and paper, scrawls 
With desperate charcoal round his darkened walls? 
All fly to Twit'nam, and in humble strain 
Apply to me, to keep them mad or vain. 

Friend to my life ! (which did not you prolong, 
The world had wanted many an idle song), 
What drop or nostrum can this plague remove? 
Or which must end me, a fool's wrath or love ? 
A dire dilemma ! either way I'm sped, 
If foes, they write, — if friends, they read me dead. 
Seized and tied down to judge, how wretched I ! 
Who can't be silent, and who will not lie: 
To laugh, were want of goodness and of grace, 
And to be grave, exceeds all power of face. 
I sit with sad civility, I read 
With honest anguish, and an aching head ; 
And drop at last, but in unwilling ears, 
This saving counsel — " Keep your peace nine years." • 

"Nine years! " cries he, who, high in Drury Lane, 
Lulled by soft zephyrs through the broken pane, 
Rhymes ere he wakes, and prints before Term ends, 
Obliged by hunger and request of friends : 
"The piece, you think, is incorrect? Why, take it; 
I'm all submission, what you'd have it, make it." 

Three things another's modest wishes bound, 
My friendship, and a prologue, and ten pound. 



284 SELECTIONS. 

Pitholeon sends to me: " You know his Grace, 
I want a patron; ask him for a place." 
Pitholeon libelled me — "but here's a letter 
Informs you, sir, 'twas when he knew no better. 
Dare you refuse him? Curll invites to dine, 
He'll write a journal, or he'll turn divine." 
Bless me ! a packet. " 'Tis a stranger sues, 
A virgin tragedy, an orphan Muse. " 
If I dislike it, " Furies, death, and rage! " 
If I approve, " Commend it to the stage." 
There (thank my stars) my whole commission ends, 
The players and I are, luckily, no friends. 
Fired that the house reject him, " 'Sdeath, I'll print it, 
And shame the fools — Your interest, sir, with Lintot." 
Lintot, dull rogue ! will think your price too much : 
" Not, sir, if you revise it, and retouch." 
All my demurs but double his attacks ; 
At last he whispers, "Do; and we go snacks." 
Glad of a quarrel, straight I clap the door : 
" Sir, let me see your works and you no more." 



You think this cruel? take it for a rule, 
No creature smarts so little as a fool. 
Let peals of laughter, Codrus ! round thee break, 
Thou unconcerned canst hear the mighty crack : 
Pit, box, and gallery in convulsions hurled, 
Thou stand'st unshook amidst a bursting world. 
Who shames a scribbler? break one cobweb through, 
He spins the slight, self -pleasing thread anew: 
Destroy his fib, or sophistry — in vain ! 
The creature's at his dirty work again, 
Throned in the centre of his thin designs, 
Proud of a vast extent of flimsy lines ! 

Pope's moral essays are satires upon the society of his 
own age, and are among the wittiest of his productions. 
In the passage quoted, we find that vulgar magnificence 
was not unknown even in the days of good Queen Anne. 






pope. 285 

At Timon's villa let us pass a day, 
Where all cry out, ' ' What sums are thrown away ! " 
So proud, so grand : of that stupendous air, 
Soft and agreeable come never there. 
Greatness with Timon, dwells in such a draught 
As brings all Brobdignag before your thought. 
To compass this, his building is a town, 
His pond an ocean, his parterre a down : 
Who but must laugh, the master when he sees, 
A puny insect, shivering at a breeze ! 
Lo, what huge heaps of littleness around ! 
The whole, a laboured quarry above ground. 
Two cupids squirt before : a lake behind 
Improves the keenness of the northern wind. 
His gardens next your admiration call, 
On every side you look, behold the wall ! 
No pleasing intricacies intervene, 
No artful wildness to perplex the scene : 
Grove nods at grove, each valley has a brother, 
And half the platform just reflects the other. 
The suffering eye inverted Nature sees, 
Trees cut to statues, statues thick as trees; 
With here a fountain, never to be played ; 
And there a summer-house, that knows no shade ; 
Here Amphitrite sails through myrtle bowers ; 
There gladiators fight, or die, in flowers ; 
Unwatered see the drooping sea-horse mourn, 
And swallows roost in Nilus' dusty urn. 

My lord advances with majestic mien, 
Smit with the mighty pleasure to be seen : 
But soft— by regular approach — not yet — 
First through the length of yon hot terrace sweat : 
And when up ten steep slopes you've dragged your thighs, 
Just at his study-door he'll bless your eyes. 

His study ! with what authors is it stored ? 
In books, not authors, curious is my Lord ; 
To all their dated backs he turns you round ; 
These Aldus printed, those Du Sueil has bound. 
Lo, some are vellum, and the rest as good 
For all his lordship knows, but they are wood. 



286 SELECTIONS. 

For Locke or Milton 'tis in vain to look, 
These shelves admit not any modern book. 

And now the chapel's silver bell you hear, 
That summons you to all the pride of prayer : 
Light quirks of music, broken and uneven, 
Make the soul dance upon a jig to Heaven. 
On painted ceilings you devoutly stare, 
Where sprawl the saints of Verrio or Laguerre, 
On gilded clouds in fair expansion lie, 
And bring all Paradise before your eye. 
To rest, the cushion and soft dean invite. 
Who never mentions hell to ears polite. 

But hark ! the chiming clocks to dinner call ; 
A hundred footsteps scrape the marble hall : 
The rich buffet well-coloured serpents grace, 
And gaping Tritons spew to wash your face. 
Is this a dinner? this a genial room? 
No, 'tis a temple, and a hecatomb. 
A solemn sacrifice, performed in state, 
You drink by measure, and to minutes eat. 
So quick retires each flying course, you'd swear 
Sancho's dread doctor and his wand were there. 
Between each act the trembling salvers ring, 
From soup to sweet-wine, and God bless the king. 
In plenty starving, tantalised in state, 
And complaisantly helped to all I hate, 
Treated, caressed, and tired, I take my leave, 
Sick of his civil pride from morn to eve ; 
I curse such lavish cost, and little skill, 
And swear no day was ever passed so ill. 

Moral Essays, Epistle IV. 

Many interesting literary opinions are to be found in the 
Epistle to Augustus, a poem under that name addressed to 
G-eorge II. 

If time improve our wits as well as wine, 
Say at what age a poet, grows divine ? 
Shall we, or shall we not, account him so, 
Who died, perhaps, a hundred years ago? 
End all dispute ; and fix the year precise 
When British bards begin to immortalize? 



pope. 287 

' ' Who lasts a century can have no flaw, 
I hold that wit a classic, good in law. " 

******* 

Shakespeare (whom you and every play-house bill 
Style the divine, the matchless, what you will) 
For gain, not glory, winged his roving flight, 
And grew immortal in his own despite. 
Ben, old and poor, as little seemed to heed 
The life to come in every poet's creed. 
Who now reads Cowley? if he pleases yet, 
His moral pleases, not his pointed wit ; 
Forgot his epic, nay Pindaric art, 
But still I love the language of his heart. 

"Yet surely, surely, these were famous men! 
What boy but hears- the sayings of old Ben? 
In all debates where critics bear a part, 
Not one but nods, and talks of Jonson's art, 
Of Shakspeare's nature, and of Cowley's wit; 
How Beaumont's judgment checked what Fletcher writ ; 
How Shadwell hasty, Wycherley was slow; 
But, for the passions, Southern sure and Rowe. 
These, only these, support the crowded stage, 
From eldest Heywpod down to Gibber's age." 

All this may be ; the people's voice is odd, 
It is, and it is not, the voice of Grod. 
To Gammer Grurton if it give the bays, 
And yet deny the Careless Husband praise, 
Or say our fathers never broke a rule ; 
Why then, I say, the public is a fool. 
But let them own that greater faults than we 
They had, and greater virtues, I'll agree. 
Spenser himself affects the obsolete, 
And Sidney's verse halts ill on Roman feet ; 
Milton's strong pinion now not Heaven can bound, 
Now, serpent-like, in prose he sweeps the ground; 
In quibbles, angel and archangel join, 
And Grod the Father turns a school-divine. 
Not that I'd lop the beauties from his book, 
Like slashing Bentley with his desperate hook, 
Or damn all Shakespeare, like the affected fool 
At Court, who hates whate'er he read at school. 



288 SELECTIONS. 

But for the wits of either Charles's days, 
The mob of gentlemen who wrote with ease ; 
Sprat, Carew, Seclley, and a hundred more 
(Like twinkling stars the Miscellanies o'er) 
One simile, that solitary shines 
In the dry desert of a thousand lines, 
Or lengthened thought that gleams through many a page, 
Has sanctified whole poems for an age. 
I lose my patience, and I own it too, 
When works are censured not as bad but new ; 
While if our elders break all reason's laws, 
These fools demand not pardon, but applause. 

On Avon's bank, where flowers eternal blow, 
If I but ask if any weed can grow; 
One tragic sentence if I dare deride, 
Which Betterton's grave action dignified, 
Or well-mouthed Booth with emphasis proclaims, 
(Though but perhaps a muster-roll of names) 
How will our fathers rise up in a rage, 
And swear all shame is lost in George's age! 
You'd think no fools disgraced the former reign, 
Did not some grave examples yet remain, 
Who scorn a lad should teach his father skill, 
And, having once been wrong, will be so still. 
He, who to seem more deep than you or I, 
Extols old bards, or Merlin's prophecy. 
Mistake him not ; he envies, not admires, 
And to debase the sons, exalts the sires. 
Had ancient times conspired to disallow 
What then was new, what had been ancient now? 
Or what remained, so worthy to be read 
By learned critics, of the mighty dead ? 
******** 

Time was, a sober Englishman would knock 
His servants up. and rise by five o'clock ; 
Instruct his family in every rule, 
And send his wife to church, his son to school. 
To worship like his fathers was his care, 
To teach their frugal virtues to his heir : 
To prove that luxury could never hold ; 
And place, on good security, his gold. 



pope. 289 

Now times are changed, and one poetic itch 
Has seized the Court and city, poor and rich : 
Sons, sires, and grandsires, all will wear the bays, 
Our wives read Milton, and our daughters plays, 
To theatres and to rehearsals throng, 
And all our grace at table is a song. 

The last selection is from The Essay on Man. 

Heav'n forming each on other to depend, 
A master, or a servant, or a friend, 
Bids each on other for assistance call, 
Till one man's weakness grows the strength of all. 
Wants, frailties, passions, closer still ally 
The common int'rest, or endear the tie. 
To these we owe true friendship, love sincere, 
Each home-felt joy that life inherits here ; 
Yet from the same we learn, in its decline, 
Those joys, those loves, those int'rests to resign : 
Taught half by reason, half by mere decay, 
To welcome death, and calmly pass away. 

Whate'er the passion, — knowledge, fame, or pelf, — 
Not one will change his neighbour with himself. 
The learn'd is happy nature to explore, 
The fool is happy that he knows no more ; 
The rich is happy in the plenty giv'n, 
The poor contents him with the care of heav'n. 
See the blind beggar dance, the cripple sing, 
The sot a hero, lunatic a king ; 
The starving chemist in his golden views 
Supremely blessed, the poet in his muse. 

See some strange comfort ev'ry state attend, 
And pride bestowed on all, a common friend: 
See some fit passion ev'ry age supply, 
Hope travels through, nor quits us when we die. 

Behold the child, by nature's kindly law 
Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw : 
Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight, 
A little louder, but as empty quite : 
Scarfs, garters, gold, amuse his riper stage, 
And beads and pray'r-books are the toys of age: 



290 SELECTIONS. 

Pleased with this bauble still, as that before ; 
Till tired he sleeps, and life's poor play is o'er. 

Meanwhile opinion gilds with varying rays 
Those painted clouds that beautify our days ; 
Each want of happiness by hope supplied, 
And each vacuity of sense by pride : 
These build as fast as knowledge can destroy ; 
In folly's cup still laughs the bubble, joy; 
One prospect lost, another still we gain ; 
And not a vanity is giv'n in vain ; 
Ev'n mean self-love becomes, by force divine, 
The scale to measure others' wants by thine. 
See, and confess, one comfort still must rise ; 
'Tis this, though man's a fool, yet God is wise ! 



ADDISON. 

Two numbers of The Spectator are given which illustrate 
Addison's gentle satire, his grace and simplicity of style, 
and his sweetness of spirit. He was fond of quoting the 
Latin poets, and begins this paper with a long extract from 
a famous satire of Horace. In this poem Addison had 
found the suggestion of his essay: 

Whence is 't, Maecenas, that so few approve 
The state they 're plac'd in, and incline to rove 

No. 558. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 23, 1714. 

It is a celebrated thought of Socrates, that if all the misfortunes 
of mankind were cast into a public stock, in order to be equally 
distributed among the whole species, those who now think them- 
selves the most unhappy would prefer the share they are already 
possessed of before that which would fall to them by such a divis- 
ion. Horace has carried this thought a great deal further in 
the motto of my paper, which implies, that the hardships or mis- 
fortunes we lie under are more easy to us than those of any other 
person would be, in case we could change conditions with him. 



ADDISON. 291 

As I was ruminating upon these two remarks, and seated in 
my elbow-chair, I insensibly fell asleep ; when on a sudden me- 
thought there was a proclamation made by Jupiter, that every 
mortal should bring in his griefs and calamities, and throw them 
together in a heap. . There was a large plain appointed for this 
purpose. I took my stand in the centre of it, and saw with a 
great deal of pleasure the whole human species marching one 
after another, and throwing down their several loads, which im- 
mediately grew up into a prodigious mountain, that seemed to 
rise above the clouds. 

There was a certain lady of a thin airy shape, who was very 
active in this solemnity. She carried a magnifying-glass in one 
of her hands, and was clothed in a loose flowing robe, embroid- 
ered with several figures of fiends and spectres, that discovered 
themselves in a thousand chimerical shapes as her garment hov- 
ered in the wind. There was something wild and distracted in 
her looks. Her name was Fancy. She led up every mortal to 
the appointed place, after having very officiously assisted him in 
making up his pack, and laying it upon his shoulders. My heart 
melted within me to see my fellow-creatures groaning under their 
respective burdens, and to consider that prodigious bulk of human 
calamities which lay before me. 

There were, however, several persons who gave me great diver- 
sion upon this occasion. I observed one bringing in a fardel very 
carefully concealed under an old embroidered cloak, which, upon 
his throwing into the heap, I discovered to be Poverty. Another, 
after a great deal of puffing, threw down his luggage, which, 
upon examining, I found to be his wife. 

There were multitudes of lovers saddled with very whimsical 
burdens composed of darts and flames ; but, what was very odd, 
though they sighed as if their hearts would break under these 
bundles of calamities, they could not persuade themselves to cast 
them into the heap, when they came up to it ; but, after a few 
faint efforts, shook their heads, and marched away as heavy 
loaden as they came. I saw multitudes of old women throw 
down their wrinkles, and several young ones who stripped them- 
selves of a tawny skin. There were very great heaps of red noses, 
large lips, and rusty teeth. The truth of it is, I was surprised to 



292 SELECTIONS. 

see the greatest part of the mountain made up of bodily deformi- 
ties. Observing one advancing towards the heap with a larger 
cargo than ordinary upon his back, I found upon his near ap- 
proach that it was only a natural hump, which he disposed of 
w T ith great joy of heart among this collection of human miseries. 
There were likewise distempers of all sorts ; though I could not 
but observe, that there were many more imaginary than real. 
One little packet I could not but take notice of, which was a 
complication of all the diseases incident to human nature, and 
was in the hand of a great many fine people ; this was called the 
spleen. But what most of all surprised me, was a remark I 
made, that there was not a single vice or folly thrown into the 
whole heap ; at which I was very much astonished, having con- 
cluded with myself that every one would take this opportunity of 
getting rid of his passions, prejudices, and frailties. 

I took notice in particular of a very profligate fellow, who I did 
not question came loaden with his crimes ; but upon searching 
into his bundle, I found that, instead of throwing his guilt from 
him, he had only laid down his memory. He was followed by 
another worthless rogue, who flung away his modesty instead of 
his ignorance. 

When the whole race of mankind had thus cast their burdens, 
the phantom which had been so busy on this occasion, seeing me 
an idle Spectator of what had passed, approached towards me. I 
grew uneasy at her presence, when of a sudden she held her mag- 
nifying-glass full before my eyes. I no sooner saw my face in it, 
but I was startled at the shortness of it, which now appeared to 
me in its utmost aggravation. The immoderate breadth of the 
features made me very much out of humour with my own coun- 
tenance, upon which I threw it from me like a mask. It hap- 
pened very luckily that one who stood by me had just before 
thrown down his visage, which it seems was too long for him. It 
was indeed extended to a most shameful length ; I believe the 
very chin was, modestly speaking, as long as my whole face. We 
had both of us an opportunity of mending ourselves ; and all the 
contributions being now brought in, every man was at liberty to 
exchange his misfortunes for those of another person. But as 
there arose many new incidents in the sequel of my vision, I shall 
reserve them for the subject of my next paper. 



ADBISOK. 293 



No. 559. FRIDAY, JUNE 25, 1714- 

In my last paper, I gave my reader a sight of that mountain of 
miseries which was made up of those several calamities that afflict 
the minds of men. I saw with unspeakable pleasure the whole 
species thus delivered from its sorrows ; though at the same time, 
as we stood round the heap, and surveyed the several materials 
of which it was composed, there was scarcely a mortal in this 
vast multitude, who did not discover what he thought pleasures 
and blessings of life, and wondered how the owners of them ever 
came to look upon them as burdens and grievances. 

As we were regarding very attentively this confusion of mise- 
ries, this chaos of calamity, Jupiter issued out a second proclama- 
tion, that every one was now at liberty to exchange his affliction, 
and to return to his habitation with any such other bundle as 
should be delivered to him. 

Upon this, Fancy began again to bestir herself, and, parcelling 
out the whole heap with incredible activity, recommended to 
every one his particular packet. The hurry and confusion at this 
time was not to be expressed. Some observations which I made 
upon the occasion I shall communicate to the public. A venera- 
ble gray-headed man, who had laid down the cholic, and who I 
found wanted an heir to his estate, snatched up an undutiful son 
that had been thrown into the heap by his angry father. The 
graceless youth, in less than a quarter of an hour, pulled the old 
gentleman by the beard, and had like to have knocked his brains 
out ; so that meeting the true father, who came towards him with 
a fit of the gripes, he begged him to take his son again, and give 
him back his cholic ; but they were incapable either of them to 
recede from the choice they had made. A poor galley-slave, who 
had thrown down his chains, took up the gout in their stead, but 
made such wry faces, that one might easily perceive he was no 
great gainer by the bargain. It was pleasant enough to see the 
several exchanges that were made for sickness against poverty, 
hunger against want of appetite, and care against pain. 

The female world were very busy among themselves in barter- 
ing for features : one was trucking a lock of gray hairs for a car- 
buncle, another was making over a short waist for a pair of round 



294 SELECTIONS. 

shoulders, and a third cheapening a bad face for a lost reputa- 
tion : but on all these occasions there was not one of them who 
did not think the new blemish, as soon as she had got it into her 
possession, much more disagreeable than the old one. I made 
the same observation on every other misfortune or calamity which 
every one in the assembly brought upon himself in lieu of what 
he had parted with : whether it be that all the evils which befall 
us are in some measure suited and proportioned to our strength, 
or that every evil becomes more supportable by our being accus- 
tomed to it, I shall not determine. 

I could not from my heart forbear pitying the poor hump- 
backed gentleman mentioned in the former paper, who went off 
a very well-shaped person with a stone in his bladder ; nor the 
fine gentleman who had struck up this bargain with him, that 
limped through a whole assembly of ladies, who used to admire 
him, with a pair of shoulders peeping over his head. 

I must not omit my own particular adventure. My friend with 
a long visage had no sooner taken upon him my short face, but 
he made such a grotesque figure in it, that as I looked upon him 
I could not forbear laughing at myself, insomuch that I put my 
own face out of countenance. The poor gentleman was so sensi- 
ble of the ridicule, that I found he was ashamed of what he had 
done : on the other side, I found that I myself had no great rea- 
son to triumph, for as I went to touch my forehead I missed the 
place, and clapped my finger upon my upper lip. Besides, as my 
nose was exceeding prominent, I gave it two or three unlucky 
knocks as I was playing my hand about my face, and aiming at 
some other part of it, I saw two other gentlemen by me who 
were in the same ridiculous circumstances. These had made a 
foolish swop between a couple of thick bandy legs and two long 
trapsticks that had no calves to them. One of these looked like 
a man walking upon stilts, and was so lifted up into the air, 
above his ordinary height, that his head turned round with it ; 
while the other made such awkward circles, as he attempted to 
walk, that he scarce knew how to move forward upon his new 
supporters. Observing him to be a pleasant kind of fellow, I 
stuck my cane in the ground, and told him I would lay him a 
bottle of wine that he did not march up to it, on a line that I 
drew for him, in a quarter of an hour. 






SWIFT. 295 

The heap was at last distributed among the two sexes, who 
made a most piteous sight, as they wandered up and down under 
the pressure of their several burdens. The whole plain was filled 
with murmurs and complaints, groans, and lamentations. Jupi- 
ter at length taking compassion on the poor mortals, ordered them 
a second time to lay down their loads, with a design to give every 
one his own again. They discharged themselves with a great 
deal of pleasure : after which, the phantom who had led them 
into such gross delusions was commanded to disappear. There 
was sent in her stead a goddess of a quite different figure : her 
motions were steady and composed, and her aspect serious, but 
cheerful. She every now and then cast her eyes towards heaven, 
and fixed them upon Jupiter : her name was Patience. She had 
no sooner placed herself by the Mount of Sorrows, but, what I 
thought very remarkable, the whole heap sunk to such a degree, 
that it did not appear a third part so big as it was before. She 
afterwards returned every man his own proper calamity, and 
teaching him how to bear it in the most commodious manner, he 
marched off with it contentedly, being very well pleased that he 
had not been left to his own choice as to the kind of evils which 
fell to his lot. 

Besides the several pieces of morality to be drawn out of this 
vision, I learnt from it never to repine at my own misfortunes, 
or to envy the happiness of another, since it is impossible for any 
man to form a right judgment of his neighbour's sufferings ; for 
which reason also I have determined never to think too lightly of 
another's complaints, but to regard the sorrows of my fellow- 
creatures with sentiments of humanity and compassion. 



SWIFT. 

The following selection from Gulliver's Travels describes 
an adventure of Gulliver among the Lilliputians, and also 
gives some account of the politics of Lilliput. The con- 
tents of the chapter are, in Swift's own words, as follows : 
" A conversation between the author and a principal secre- 
tary, concerning the affairs of that empire. The author's 



296 SELECTIONS. 

offer to serve the emperor in his wars. The author, by an 
extraordinary stratagem, prevents an invasion." The pupil 
should consider three things : whether the story is well 
told ; what more than the story Swift meant to convey ; 
and whether this passage illustrates his style as described 
on page 132. 

One morning, Reldresal, principal secretary (as they style him) 
for private affairs, came to my house attended only by one ser- 
vant. He ordered his coach to wait at a distance, and desired I 
would give him an hour's audience ; which I readily consented 
to, on account of his quality and personal merits, as well as of 
the many good offices he had done me during my solicitations at 
court. I offered to lie down, that he might the more conven- 
iently reach my ear ; but he chose rather to let me hold him in 
my hand during our conversation. He began with compliments 
on my liberty; said, "he might pretend to some merit in it ; " 
but however added, ' ' that if it had not been for the present sit- 
uation of things at court, perhaps I might not have obtained it 
so soon. For," said he, " as flourishing a condition as we may 
appear to be in to foreigners, we labour under two mighty evils ; 
a violent faction at home, and the danger of an invasion, by a 
most potent enemy, from abroad. As to the first, you are to 
understand that for above seventy moons past there have been 
two struggling parties in this empire, under the names of Tra- 
mecksan and Slamecksan, from the high and low heels of their 
shoes, by which they distinguish themselves. It is alleged, in- 
deed, that the high heels are most agreeable to our ancient 
constitution ; but, however this be, his majesty has determined 
to make use only of low heels in the administration of the govern- 
ment, and all offices in the gift of the crown, as you cannot but 
observe ; and particularly, that his majesty's imperial heels are 
lower at least by a drurr than any of his court : drurr is a meas- 
ure about the fourteenth part of an inch. The animosities be- 
tween these two parties run so high, that they will neither eat, 
nor drink, nor talk with each other. We compute the Trameck- 
san, or high heels, to exceed us in number ; but the power is 
wholly on our side. We apprehend his imperial highness, the 



SWIFT. 297 

heir to the crown, to have some tendency towards the high heels ; 
at least, we can plainly discover that one of his heels is higher 
than the other, which gives him a hobble in his gait. Now, in 
the midst of these intestine disquiets, we are threatened with an 
invasion from the island of Blefuscu, which is the other great 
empire of the universe, almost as large and powerful as this of 
his majesty. For, as to what we have heard you affirm, that 
there are other kingdoms and states in the world, inhabited by 
human creatures as large as yourself, our philosophers are in 
much doubt, and would rather conjecture that you dropped from 
the moon, or one of the stars ; because it is certain that a hun- 
dred mortals of your bulk would in a short time destroy all the 
fruits and cattle of his majesty's dominions : besides, our histo- 
ries of six thousand moons make no mention of any other regions 
than the two great empires of Lilliput and Blefuscu. Which two 
mighty powers have, as I was going to tell you, been engaged in 
a most obstinate war for six-and-thirty moons past. It began 
upon the following occasion : it is allowed on all hands that the 
primitive way of breaking eggs, before we eat them, was upon 
the larger end ; but his present majesty's grandfather, while he 
was a boy, going to eat an egg, and breaking it according to the 
ancient practice, happened to cut one or" his fingers. Whereupon, 
the emperor his father published an edict, commanding all his 
subjects, upon great penalties, to break the smaller end of their 
eggs. The people so highly resented this law, that our histories 
tell us there have been six rebellions raised on that account ; 
wherein one emperor lost his life, and another his crown. These 
civil commotions were constantly fomented by the monarchs of 
Blefuscu ; and when they were quelled, the exiles always fled for 
refuge to that empire. It is computed that eleven thousand per- 
sons have at several times suffered death, rather than submit to 
break their eggs at the smaller end. Many hundred large volumes 
have been published upon this controversy : but the books of the 
Big-endians have been long forbidden, and the whole party ren- 
dered incapable by law of holding employments. During the 
course of these troubles, the emperors of Blefuscu did frequently 
expostulate by their ambassadors, accusing us of making a schism 
in religion, by offending against a fundamental doctrine of our 
great prophet Lustrog, in the fifty-fourth chapter of the Blun- 



298 s ; ELECTIONS. 

decral, which is their Alcoran. This, however, is thought to be 
a mere strain upon the text ; for the words are these : that all 
true believers break their eggs at the convenient end. And which 
is the convenient end seems, in my humble opinion, to be left to 
every man's conscience, or at least in the power of the chief 
magistrate to determine. Now, the Big-endian exiles have found 
so much credit in the emperor of Blefuscu's court, and so much 
private assistance and encouragement from their party here at 
home, that a bloody war had been carried on between the two 
empires for six-and-thirty moons, with various success : during 
which time we have lost forty capital ships and a much greater 
number of smaller vessels, together with thirty thousand of our 
best seamen and soldiers ; and the damage received by the enemy 
is reckoned to be somewhat greater than ours. However, they 
have now equipped a numerous fleet, and are just preparing to 
make a descent upon us ; and his imperial majesty, placing great 
confidence in your valour and strength, has commanded me to 
lay this account of his affairs before you." 

I desired the secretary to present my humble duty to the em- 
peror ; and to let him know, "that I thought it would not become 
me, who was a foreigner, to interfere with parties ; but I was 
ready, with the hazard of my life, to defend his person and state 
against all invaders." 

********* 

The empire of Blefuscu is an island situated to the north-east 
of Lilliput, from which it is parted only by a channel of eight 
hundred yards wide. I had not yet seen it, and upon this notice 
of an intended invasion, I avoided appearing on that side of the 
coast, for fear of being discovered by some of the enemy's ships, 
who had received no intelligence of me ; all intercourse between 
the two empires having been strictly forbidden during the war, 
upon pain of death, and an embargo laid by our emperor upon 
all vessels whatsoever. I communicated to his majesty a project 
I had formed of seizing the enemy's whole fleet ; which, as our 
scouts assured us, lay at anchor in the harbour, ready to sail with 
the first fair wind. I consulted the most experienced seamen 
upon the depth of the channel, which they had often plumbed ; 
who told me that in the middle at high water it was seventy 
glumgluffs deep, which is about six feet of European measure ; 



swift. 299 

and the rest of it fifty glumgluffs at most. I walked toward the 
north-east coast, over against Blefuscu, where, lying down be- 
hind a hillock, I took out my small perspective glass, and viewed 
the enemy's fleet at anchor, consisting of about fifty men-of-war, 
and a great number of transports : I then came back to my house, 
and gave orders (for which I had a warrant) for a great quantity 
of the strongest cable and bars of iron. The cable was about as 
thick as packthread, and the bars of the length and size of a 
knitting-needle. I trebled the cable to make it stronger, and for 
the same reason I twisted three of the iron bars together, bend- 
ing the extremities into a hook. Having thus fixed fifty hooks to 
as many cables, I went back to the north-east coast, and, putting 
off my coat, shoes, and stockings, walked into the sea, in my 
leathern jerkin, about half an hour before high water. I waded 
with what haste I could, and swam in the middle about thirty 
yards, till I felt ground. I arrived at the fleet in less than half 
an hour. The enemy was so frighted when they saw me, that 
they leaped out of their ships, and swam to shore, where there 
could not be fewer than thirty thousand souls : I then took my 
tackling, and, fastening a hook to the hole at the prow of each, I 
tied all the cords together at the end. While I was thus em- 
ployed, the enemy discharged several thousand arrows, many of 
which stuck in my hands and face ; and, besides the excessive 
smart, gave me much disturbance in my work. My greatest ap- 
prehension was for mine eyes, which I should have infallibly lost 
if I had not suddenly thought of an expedient. I kept, among 
other little necessaries, a pair of spectacles in a private pocket, 
which, as I observed before, had escaped the emperor's searchers. 
These I took out, and fastened as strongly as I could upon my 
nose, and thus armed, went on boldly with my work, in spite of 
the enemy's arrows ; many of which struck against the glasses of 
my spectacles, but without any other effect, farther than a little 
to discompose them. I had now fastened all the hooks, and, tak- 
ing the knot in my hand, began to pull ; but not a ship would 
stir, for they were all too fast held by their anchors, so that the 
boldest part of my enterprise remained. I therefore let go the 
cord, and, leaving the hooks fixed to the ships, I resolutely cut 
with my knife the cables that fastened the anchors, receiving 
about two hundred shots in my face 'and hands ; then I took up 



300 SELECTIONS. 

the knotted end of the cables, to which my hooks were tied, and 
with great ease drew fifty of the enemy's largest men-of-war 
after me. 

The Blefuscudians, who had not the least imagination of what 
I intended, were at first confounded with astonishment. They 
had seen me cut the cables, and thought my design was only to 
let the ships run adrift, or fall foul on each other ; but when 
they perceived the whole fleet moving in order, and saw me pull- 
ing at the end, they set up such a scream of grief and despair as 
it is almost impossible to describe or conceive. When I had got 
out of danger, I stopped awhile to pick out the arrows that stuck 
in my hands and face ; and rubbed on some of the same ointment 
that was given me at my first arrival, as I formerly mentioned. 
I then took off my spectacles, and, waiting about an hour, till 
the tide was a little fallen, I waded through the middle with my 
cargo, and arrived safe at the royal port of Lilliput. 

The emperor and his whole court stood on the shore, expecting 
the issue of this great adventure. They saw the ships move for- 
ward in a large half -moon, but could not discern me, who was up 
to my breast in water. When I advanced to the middle of the 
channel they were yet more in pain, because I was under water 
to my neck. The emperor concluded me to be drowned, and that 
the enemy's fleet was approaching in a hostile manner : but he 
was soon eased of his fears ; for, the channel growing shallower 
at every step I made, I came in a short time within hearing, and, 
holding up the end of the cable, by which the fleet was fastened, 
I cried in a loud voice, "Long live the most puissant king of 
Lilliput ! " This great prince received me at my landing with all 
possible encomiums, and created me a nardac upon the spot, 
which is the highest title of honour among them. 

When Steele established The Tatler, lie called in the aid 
of several friends. Addison was his most valuable assist- 
ant, but Swift contributed several papers full of wit and 
good sense. In the following Tatler he sets forth in a 
feeling manner the trials that he has encountered in 
visiting. 



SWIFT. 301 

Those inferior duties of life, which the French call les petites 
■morales, or the smaller morals, are, with us, distinguished by 
the name of good manners, or breeding. This I look upon, in 
the general notion of it, to be a sort of artificial good sense, 
adapted to the meanest capacities, and introduced to make man- 
kind easy in their commerce with each other. Low and little 
understandings, without some rules of this kind, would be per- 
petually wandering into a thousand indecencies and irregularities 
in behaviour ; and in their ordinary conversation, fall into the 
same boisterous familiarities that one observes among them when 
a debauch has quite taken away the use of their reason. In other 
instances it is odd to consider, that, for want of common discre- 
tion, the very end of good breeding is wholly perverted ; and 
civility, intended to make us easy, is employed in laying chains 
and fetters upon us, in debarring us of our wishes, and in cross- 
ing our most reasonable desires and inclinations. This abuse 
reigns chiefly in the country, as I found, to my vexation, when 
I was last there, in a visit I made to a neighbour about two miles 
from my cousin. As soon as I entered the parlour, they put me 
into the great chair that stood close by a huge fire, and kept me 
there by force, until I was almost stifled. Then a boy came in a 
great hurry to pull off my boots, which I in vain opposed, urging 
that I must return soon after dinner. In the mean time, the 
good lady whispered her eldest daughter, and slipped a key into 
her hand ; the girl returned instantly with a beer glass half full 
of aqua mirabilis and syrup of gillyflowers. I took as much as 
I had a mind for, but madam avowed that I should drink it off ; 
for she was sure it would do me good after coming out of the cold 
air ; and I was forced to obey, which absolutely took away my 
stomach. When dinner came in, I had a mind to sit at a dis- 
tance from the fire ; but they told me it was as much as my life 
was worth, and set me with, my back against it. Although my 
appetite was quite gone, I was resolved to force down as much as 
I could, and desired the leg of a pullet, " Indeed Mr. Bickerstaff 
(says the lady), you must eat a wing to oblige me ; " and so put 
a couple upon my plate. I was persecuted at this rate during 
the whole meal ; as often as I called for small-beer, the master 
tipped the wink, and the servant brought me a brimmer of Octo- 



302 SELECTIONS. 

ber. Some time after dinner, I ordered my cousin's man, who 
came with me, to get ready the horses ; but it was resolved I 
should not stir that night ; and when I seemed pretty much bent 
upon going, they ordered the stable door to be locked, and the 
children hid my cloak and boots. The next question was, What 
would I have for supper ? I said, I never eat anything at night : 
but was at last, in my own defence, obliged to name the first 
thing that came into my head. After three hours spent chiefly 
in apologies for my entertainment, insinuating to me, " That this 
was the worst time of the year for provisions ; that they were at 
a great distance from any market ; that they were afraid I should 
be starved ; and that they knew they kept me to my loss ; " the 
lady went, and left me to her husband ; for they took special 
care I should never be alone. As soon as her back was turned, 
the little misses ran backward and forward every moment, and 
constantly as they came in, or went out, made a curtsey directly 
at me, which, in good manners, I was forced to return with a 
bow, and " Your humble servant, pretty miss." Exactly at eight 
the mother came up, and discovered, by the redness of her face, 
that supper was not far off. It was twice as large as the dinner, 
and my persecution doubled in proportion. I desired, at my 
usual hour, to go to my repose, and was conducted to my cham- 
ber by the gentleman, his lady, and the whole train of children. 
They importuned me to drink something before I went to bed ; 
and, upon my refusing, left at last a bottle of stingo, as they 
called it, for fear I should wake, and be thirsty in the night. I 
was forced in the morning to rise and dress myself in the dark, 
because they would not suffer my kinsman's servant to disturb 
me at the hour I desired to be called. I was now resolved to 
break through all measures to get away ; and, after sitting down 
to a monstrous breakfast of cold beef, mutton, neat's tongues, 
venison-pasty, and stale beer, took leave of the family. But the 
gentleman would needs see me part of the way, and carry me a 
short cut through his own ground, which he told me would save 
half a mile's riding. This last piece of civility had like to have 
cost me dear, being once or twice in danger of my neck, by leap- 
ing over his ditches, and at last forced to alight in the dirt, when 
my horse, having slipped his bridle, ran away, and took us up 
more than an hour to recover him again. 



DEFOE. 303 



DEFOE. 

The first selection describes the shipwreck of Robinson 
Crusoe. It is an example of Defoe's exact and literal, but 
rapid and vivid narrative. His description of a storm is 
very different from that which a more imaginative man 
would have written, and yet, in its own way, Defoe's 
method is thoroughly artistic. 

And now our ease was very dismal indeed ; for we all saw 
plainly, that the sea went so high, that the boat could not live, 
and that we should be inevitably drowned. As to making sail, 
we had none, nor, if we had, could we have done anything with 
it ; so we worked at the oar towards the land, though with 
heavy hearts, like men going to execution ; for we all knew, 
that when the boat came nearer the shore, she would be dashed 
in a thousand pieces by the breach of the sea. However, we 
committed our souls to God in the most earnest manner ; and 
the wind driving us towards the shore, we hastened our de- 
struction with our own hands, pulling as well as we could towards 
land. 

What the shore was, whether rock or sand, whether steep or 
shoal, we knew not ; the only hope that could rationally give us 
the least shadow of expectation, was, if we might happen into 
some bay or gulf, or the mouth of some river, where by great 
chance we might have run our boat in, or got under the lee of 
the land, and perhaps made smooth water. But there was noth- 
ing of this appeared ; but as we made nearer and nearer the 
shore, the land looked more frightful than the sea. 

After we had rowed, or rather driven about a league and 
a half, as we reckoned it, a raging wave, mountain-like, came 
rolling astern of us, and plainly bade us expect the coup de grace. 
In a word, it took us with such a fury, that it overset the boat 
at once ; and separating us as well from the boat as from one 
another, gave us not time to say, God ! for we were all 
swallowed up in a moment. 

Nothing can describe the confusion of thought which I felt, 



304 SELECTIONS. 

when I sunk into the water : for though I swam very well, yet 
I could not deliver myself from the waves so as to draw breath, 
till that wave having driven me, or rather carried me a vast 
way on towards the shore, and having spent itself, went back, 
and left me upon the land almost dry, but half dead with the 
water I took in. I had so much presence of mind, as well as 
breath left, that seeing myself nearer the main land than I ex- 
pected, I got upon my feet, and endeavored to make on towards 
the land as fast as I could, before another wave should return, 
and take me up again. But I soon found it was impossible to 
avoid it ; for I saw the sea coming after me as high as a great 
hill, and as furious as an enemy which I had no means or 
strength to contend with ; my business was to hold my breath, 
and raise myself upon the water, if I could ; and so by swim- 
ming to preserve my breathing, and pilot myself towards the 
shore, if possible ; my greatest concern now being, that the sea, 
as it would carry me a great way towards the shore when it 
came on, might not carry me back again with it when it gave 
back towards the sea. 

The wave that came upon me again, buried me at once twenty 
or thirty feet deep in its own body ; and I could feel myself 
carried with a mighty force and swiftness towards the shore a 
very great way ; but I held my breath, and assisted myself to 
swim still forward with all my might. I was ready to burst 
with holding my breath, when, as I felt myself rising up, so 
to my immediate relief, I found my head and hands shoot out 
above the surface of the water ; and though it was not two 
seconds of time that I could keep myself so, yet it relieved me 
greatly, gave me breath and new courage. I was covered again 
with water a good while, but not so long but I held it out ; and 
finding the water had spent itself, and began to return, I struck 
forward against the return of the waves, and felt ground again 
with my feet. I stood still a few moments to recover breath, 
and till the water went from me, and then took to my heels and 
run with what strength I had farther towards the shore. But 
neither would this deliver me from the fury of the sea, which 
came pouring in after me again, and twice more I was lifted up 
by the waves and carried forwards as before, the shore being 
very flat. 



DEFOE. 305 

The last time of these two had well near been fatal to me ; for 
the sea having hurried me along as before, landed me, or rather 
dashed me against a piece of a rock, and that with such force, as 
it left me senseless, and indeed helpless, as to my own deliver- 
ance ; for the blow taking my side and breast, beat the breath 
as it were quite out of my body ; and had it returned again 
immediately, I must have been strangled in the water ; but I 
recovered a little before the return of the waves, and seeing I 
should be covered again with the water, I resolved to hold fast 
by a piece of the rock, and so to hold my breath, if possible, till 
the wave went back ; now as the waves were not so high as at 
first, being nearer land, I held my hold till the wave abated, 
and then fetched another run, which brought me so near the 
shore, that the next wave, though it went over me, yet did not so 
swallow me up as to carry me away, and the next run I took, I 
got to the main land, where, to my great comfort, I clambered 
up the cliffs of the shore, and sat me down upon the grass, free 
from danger, and quite out of the reach of the water. 

The second selection shows Eobinson Crusoe after he has 
taken up his abode on the island. His practical and busi- 
ness-like summing up of the situation is very characteristic 
of Defoe. The homely details of the story give it a reality 
that fastens every scene secure in the memory. Few novels 
read yesterday are remembered so distinctly as Robinson 
Crusoe read, perhaps, twenty years ago. 

I now began to consider seriously my condition, and the cir- 
cumstance I was reduced to, and I drew up the state of my 
affairs in writing, not so much to leave them to any that were to 
come after me, for I was like to have but few heirs, as to de- 
liver my thoughts from daily poring upon them, and afflictiug 
my mind ; and as my reason began now to master my despond- 
ency, I began to comfort myself as well as I could, and to set 
the good against the evil, that I might have something to dis- 
tinguish my case from worse ; and I stated it very impartially, 
like debtor and creditor, the comforts I enjoyed against the 
miseries I suffered, thus ;— 



306 



SELECTIONS 



EVIL. 

I am cast upon a horrible 
desolate island, void of all hope 
of recovery. 

I am singled out and sepa- 
rated, as it were, from all the 
world to be miserable. 



I am divided from mankind, 
a solitaire, one banished from 
human society. 

I have not clothes to cover 
me. 



I am without any defence or 
means to resist any violence of 
man or beast. 



I have no soul to speak to, 
or relieve me. 



GOOD. 

But I am alive, and not 
drowned, as all my ship's com- 
pany was. 

But I am singled out too 
from all the ship's crew to be 
spared from death ; and He 
that miraculously saved me 
from death, can deliver me 
from this condition. 

But I am not starved and 
perishing on a barren place, 
affording no sustenance. 

But I am in a hot climate, 
where if I had clothes I could 
hardly wear them. 

But I am cast on an island, 
where I see no wild beasts to 
hurt me, as I saw on the coast 
of Africa : and what if I had 
been shipwrecked there ? 

But God wonderfully sent 
the ship in near enough to the 
shore, that I have got out as 
many necessary things as will 
either supply my wants or en- 
able me to supply myself even 
as long as I live. 



Upon the whole, here was an undoubted testimony, that there 
was scarce any condition in the world so miserable, but there was 
something negative or something positive to be thankful for in 
it ; and let this stand as a direction from the experience of the 
most miserable of all conditions in this world, that we may 
always find in it something to comfort ourselves from, and to 
set in the description of good and evil, on the credit side of the 
account. 

Having now brought my mind a little to relish my condition, 



DEFOE. 307 

and given over looking out to sea, to see if I could spy a ship ; I 
say, giving over these things, I began to apply myself to ac- 
commodate my way of living, and to make things as easy to me 
as I could. 

I have already described my habitation, which was a tent 
under the side of a rock, surrounded with a strong pale of posts 
and cables, but I might now rather call it a wall, for I raised 
a kind of wall up against it of turfs, about two feet thick on the 
outside, and after some time, I think it was a year and a half, 
I raised rafters from it leaning to the rock, and thatched or 
covered it with boughs of trees, and such things as I could get 
to keep out the rain, which I found at some times of the year 
very violent. 

I have already observed how T brought all my goods into this 
pale, and into the cave which I had made behind me : but 
I must observe too that at first this was a confused heap of 
goods, which as they lay in no order, so they took up all my 
place ; I had no room to turn myself ; so I set myself to en- 
large my cave and works farther into the earth ; for it was a 
loose sandy rock, which yielded easily to the labor I bestowed 
on it : and so when I found I was pretty safe as to beasts of 
prey, I worked sideways to the right hand into the rock ; and 
then turning to the right again, worked quite out, and made 
me a door to come out, on the outside of my pale or fortification. 

This gave me not only egress and regress, as it was a back way 
to my tent and to my storehouse, but gave me room to store my 
goods. 

And now I began to apply myself to make such necessary things 
as I found I most wanted, as particularly a chair and a table ; for 
without these I was not able to enjoy the few comforts I had in 
the world ; I could not write or eat, or do several things with so 
much pleasure without a table. 

So I went to work ; and here I must needs observe, that as 
reason is the substance and original of the mathematics, so by 
stating and squaring everything by reason, and by making the 
most rational judgment of things, every man may be in time 
master of every mechanic art. I had never handled a tool in my 
life, and yet in time by labor, application and contrivance, I 
found at last that I wanted nothing but I could have made it, 



308 SELECTIONS. 

especially if I had had tools ; however, I made abundance of 
things, even without tools, and some with no more tools than 
an adze and a hatchet, which perhaps were never made that way 
before, and that with infinite labour : for example, if I wanted 
a board, I had no other way but to cut down a tree, set it on 
an edge before me, and hew it flat on either side with my axe, till 
I had brought it to be thin as a plank, and then dub it smooth 
with my adze. It is true, by this method I could make but one 
board out of a whole tree, but this I had no remedy for but pa- 
tience, any more than I had for the prodigious deal of time and 
labor which it took me up to make a plank or board : but my 
time or labor was little worth, and so it was as well employed 
one way as another. 

However, I made me a table and a chair, as I observed above, 
in the first place ; and this I did out of the short pieces of boards 
that I brought on the raft from the ship. But when I had wrought 
out some boards, as above, I made large shelves of the breadth of 
a foot and a half one over another, all along one side of my 
cave, to lay all my tools, nails, and iron-work, and in a word, to 
separate everything at large into their places, that I might come 
easily at them ; I knocked pieces into the wall of the rock to 
hang my guns and all things that would hang up. 

So that had my cave been to be seen, it looked like a general mag- 
azine of all necessary things, and I had everything so ready at my 
hand, that it was a great pleasure to me to see all my goods in such 
order, and especially to find my stock of all necessaries so great. 

And now it was when I began to keep a journal of every day's 
employment, for indeed at first I was in too much hurry, and 
not only hurry as to labour, but in too much discomposure of 
mind, and my journal would have been full of many dull things. 
For example, I must have said thus : Sept. the '30th, after I had 
got to shore, and had escaped drowning, instead of being thank- 
ful to God for my deliverance, I ran about the shore, wringing my 
hands and beating my head and face, exclaiming at my misery, 
and crying out, I was undone, undone, till tired and faint I was 
forced to lie down on the ground to repose, but durst not sleep, 
for fear of being devoured. 

Some days after this, and after I had been on board the ship, 
and got all that I could out of her, yet I could not forbear getting 



J H M" S K . 309 

up to the top of a little mountain, and looking out to sea in 
hopes of seeing a ship, then fancy at a vast distance I spied a 
sail, please myself with the hopes of it, and then after looking 
steadily till I was almost blind, lose it quite, and sit down and 
weep like a child, and thus increase my misery by my folly. 

But having gotten over these things in some measure, and 
having settled my household stuff and habitation, made me a 
table and chair, and all as handsome about me as I could, I 
began to keep my journal, of which I shall here give you the 
copy (though in it will be told all these particulars over again) 
as long as it lasted, for having no more ink I was forced to 
leave it off. 

JOHNSON. 

Most readers will agree with Boswell that the Lives 
of the Poets constitute " the work which of all Dr. John- 
son's writings will perhaps be read most generally and with 
most pleasure." We see here Johnson's style at its best : 
vigorous, original, and clear as the opinions which it 
expresses. The following selection sets forth his estimate 
of Addison's service to the world. 

If any judgement be made, from his books, of his moral charac- 
ter, nothing will be found but purity and excellence. Knowledge 
of mankind indeed, less extensive than that of Addison, will 
shew, that to write, and to live, are very different. Many who 
praise virtue, do no more than praise it. Yet it is reasonable to 
believe that Addison's professions and practice were at no great 
variance, since, amidst that storm of faction in which most of his 
life was passed, though his station made him conspicuous, and 
his activity made him formidable, the character given him by his 
friends was never contradicted by his enemies : of those with 
whom interest or opinion united him, he had not only the esteem, 
but the kindness ; and of others whom the violence of opposition 
drove against him, though he might lose the love, he retained 
the reverence. 

It is justly observed by Tickell, that he employed wit on the 
side of virtue and religion. He not only made the proper use of 



310 SELECTIONS. 

wit himself, but taught it to others ; and from his time it has been 
generally subservient to the cause of reason and of truth. He has 
dissipated the prejudice that had long connected gaiety with vice, 
and easiness of manners with laxity of principles. He has re- 
stored virtue to its dignity, and taught innocence not to be 
ashamed. This is an elevation of literary character, above all 
Gh'eek, above all Roman fame. No greater felicity can genius 
attain than that of having purified intellectual pleasure, separated 
mirth from indecency, and wit from licentiousness ; of having 
taught a succession of writers to bring elegance and gaiety to the 
aid of goodness ; and, if I may use expressions yet more awful, of 
having turned many to righteousness. 

********* 

That he always wrote as he would think it necessary to write 
now, cannot be affirmed ; his instructions were such as the char- 
acter of his readers made proper. That general knowledge which 
now circulates in common talk, was in his time rarely to be found. 
Men not professing learning were not ashamed of ignorance ; and 
in the female world, any acquaintance with books was distin- 
guished only to be censured. His purpose was to infuse literary 
curiosity, by gentle and unsuspected conveyance, into the gay, 
the idle, and the wealthy ; he therefore presented knowledge in 
the most alluring form, not lofty and austere, but accessible and 
familiar. When he shewed them their defects, he shewed them 
likewise that they might be easily supplied. His attempt suc- 
ceeded ; enquiry was awakened, and comprehension expanded. 
An emulation of intellectual elegance was excited, and from his 
time to our own, life has been gradually exalted, and conversa- 
tion purified and enlarged. 

Dryden had, not many years before, scattered criticism over 
his Prefaces with very little parsimony ; but though he some- 
times condescended to be somewhat familiar, his manner was 
in general too scholastick for those who had yet their rudi- 
ments to learn, and found it not easy to understand their 
master. His observations were framed rather for those that 
were learning to write, than for those that read only to talk. 

An instructor like Addison was now wanting, whose remarks 
being superficial, might be easily understood, and being just, 
might prepare the mind for more attainments. Had he pre- 



JOHKSOK. 311 

sented Paradise Lost to the publick with all the pomp of system 
and severity of science, the criticism would perhaps have been 
admired, and the poem still have been neglected ; but by the 
blandishments of gentleness and facility, he has made Milton an 
universal favourite, with whom readers of every class think it 
necessary to be pleased. 

********* 

As a describer of life and manners, he must be allowed to stand 
perhaps the first of the first rank. His humour, which, as Steele 
observes, is peculiar to himself, is so happily diffused as to give 
the grace of novelty to domestick scenes and daily occurrences. 
He never outsteps the modesty of nature, nor raises merriment 
or wonder by the violation of truth. His figures neither divert 
by distortion, nor amaze by aggravation. He copies life with so 
much fidelity, that he can be hardly said to invent ; yet his exhi- 
bitions have an air so much original, that it is difficult to suppose 
them not merely the product of imagination. 

As a teacher of wisdom, h& may be confidently followed. His 
religion has nothing in it enthusiastic!*: or superstitious : he ap- 
pears neither weakly credulous nor wantonly sceptical ; his mo- 
rality is neither dangerously lax, nor impracticably rigid. All 
the enchantment of fancy, and all the cogency of argument, are 
employed to recommend to the reader his real interest, the care 
of pleasing the Author of his being. Truth is shewn sometimes 
as the phantom of a vision, sometimes appears half-veiled in an 
allegory ; sometimes attracts regard in the robes of fancy, and 
sometimes steps forth in the confidence of reason. She wears a 
thousand dresses, and in all is pleasing. 

His prose is the model of the middle style ; on grave subjects 
not formal, on light occasions not groveling ; pure without scru- 
pulosity, and exact without apparent elaboration ; always equa- 
ble, and always easy, without glowing words or pointed sentences. 
Addison never deviates from his track to snatch a grace ; he 
seeks no ambitious ornaments, and tries no hazardous innova- 
tions. His page is always luminous, but never blazes in unex- 
pected splendour. 

It was apparently his principal endeavour to avoid all harsh- 
ness and severity of diction ; he is therefore sometimes verbose 
in his transitions and connections, and sometimes descends too 



312 SELECTIONS. 

much to the language of conversation ; yet if his languagB had 
been less idiomatical, it might have lost somewhat of its genuine 
Anglicism. What he attempted, he performed ; he is never 
feeble, and he did not wish to be energetick ; he is never rapid, 
and he never stagnates. His sentences have neither studied 
amplitude, nor affected brevity : his periods, though not dili- 
gently rounded, are voluble and easy. Whoever wishes to attain 
an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not 
ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of 
Addison. 

Johnson's famous parallel between Dryden and Pope will 
be read with interest by the pupil who has studied those 
writers. 

He professed to have learned his poetry from Dryden, whom, 
whenever an opportunity was presented, he praised through his 
whole life with unvaried liberality ; and perhaps his character 
may receive some illustration, if he be compared with his master. 

Integrity of understanding and nicety of discernment were not 
allotted in a less proportion to Dryden than to Pope. The recti- 
tude of Dryden's mind was sufficiently shewn by the dismission 
of his poetical prejudices, and the rejection of unnatural thoughts 
and rugged numbers. But Dryden never desired to apply all the 
judgement that he had. He wrote, and professed to write, merely 
for the people ; and when he pleased others, he contented him- 
self. He spent no time in struggles to rouse latent powers ; he 
never attempted to make that better which was already good, nor 
often to mend what he must have knowm to be faulty. He wrote, 
as he tells us, with very little consideration ; when occasion or 
necessity called upon him, he poured out what the present mo- 
ment happened to supply, and, when once it had passed the 
press, ejected it from his mind ; for when he had no pecuniary 
interest, he had no further solicitude. 

Pope was not content to satisfy ; he desired to excel, and there- 
fore always endeavoured to do his best : he did not court the 
candour, but dared the judgement of his reader, and, expecting 
no indulgence from others, he shewed none to himself. He ex- 
amined lines and words with minute and punctilious observation, 



JOHKSOK. 313 

and retouched every part with indefatigable diligence, till he had 
left nothing to be forgiven. 

For this reason he kept his pieces very long in his hands, while 
he considered and reconsidered them. The only poems which can 
be supposed to have been written with such regard to the times 
as might hasten their publication, were the two satires of Thirty- 
eight ; of which Dodsley told me, that they were brought to him 
by the author, that they might be fairly copied. ' ' Almost every 
line," he said, " was then written twice over ; I gave him a clean 
transcript, which he sent some time afterwards to me for the 
press, with almost every line written twice over a second time." 

His declaration, that his care for his works ceased at their 
publication, was not strictly true. His parental attention never 
abandoned them ; what he found amiss in the first edition, he 
silently corrected in those that followed. He appears to have 
revised the Iliad, and freed it from some of its imperfections ; 
and the Essay on Criticism received many improvements after its 
first appearance. It will seldom be found that he altered with- 
out adding clearness, elegance, or vigour. Pope had perhaps the 
judgement of Dryden ; but Dry den certainly wanted the diligence 
of Pope. 

In acquired knowledge, the superiority must be allowed to 
Dryden, whose education was more scholastick, and who before 
he became an author had been allowed more time for study, with 
better means of information. His mind has a larger range, and 
he collects his images and illustrations from a more extensive cir- 
cumference of science. Dryden knew more of man in his general 
nature, and Pope in his local manners. The notions of Dryden 
were formed by comprehensive speculation, and those of Pope by 
minute attention. There is more dignity in the knowledge of 
Dryden, and more certainty in that of Pope. 

Poetry was not the sole praise of either ; for both excelled like- 
wise in prose ; but Pope did not borrow his prose frem his pre- 
decessor. The style of Dryden is capricious and varied, that of 
Pope is cautious and uniform ; Dryden obeys the motions of his 
own mind, Pope constrains his mind to his own rules of composi- 
tion. Dryden is sometimes vehement and rapid ; Pope is always 
smooth, uniform, and gentle. Dryden's page is a natural field, 
rising into inequalities, and diversified by the varied exuberance 



314 SELECTIOKS. 

of abundant vegetation ; Pope's is a velvet lawn, shaven by the 
scythe, and levelled by the roller. 

Of genius, that power which constitutes a poet ; that quality 
without which judgement is cold and knowledge is inert ; that 
energy which collects, combines, amplifies, and animates ; the 
superiority must, with some hesitation, be allowed to Dryden. 
It is not to be inferred that of this poetical vigour Pope had only 
a little because Dryden had more ; for every other writer since 
Milton must give place to Pope ; and even of Dryden it must be 
said, that if he has brighter paragraphs, he has not better poems. 
Dryden's performances were always hasty, either excited by some 
external occasion, or extorted by domestick necessity ; he com- 
posed without consideration, and published without correction. 
What his mind could supply at call, or gather in one excursion, 
was all that he sought, and all that he gave. The dilatory cau- 
tion of Pope enabled him to condense his sentiments, to multiply 
his images, and to accumulate all that study might produce, or 
chance might supply. If the flights of Dryden therefore are 
higher, Pope continues longer on the wing. If of Dryden's fire 
the blaze is brighter, of Pope's the heat is more regular and con- 
stant. Dryden often surpasses expectation, and Pope never falls 
below it. Dryden is read with frequent astonishment, and Pope 
with perpetual delight. 

The following extract from BoswelPs Life of Johnson 
relates how Boswell first made the acquaintance of his hero, 
and shows with great distinctness the characters of the two 
men. Let the pupil consider what traits of each are to be 
discovered here. 

This [1763] is to me a memorable year ; for in it I had the hap- 
piness to obtain the acquaintance of that extraordinary man whose 
memoirs I am now writing ; an acquaintance which I shall ever 
esteem as one of the most fortunate circumstances in my life. 
Though then but two-and-twenty, I had for several years read his 
works with delight and instruction, and had the highest reverence 
for their author, which had grown up in my fancy into a kind of 
mysterious veneration, by figuring to myself a state of solemn 



JOHKSOK. 315 

elevated abstraction in which I supposed him to live in the im- 
mense metropolis of London. Mr. Gentleman, a native of Ire- 
land, who passed some years in Scotland as a player, and as an 
instructor in the English language, a man whose talents and 
worth were depressed by misfortunes, had given me a representa- 
tion of the figure and manner of Dictionary Johnson ! as he was 
then called ; and during my first visit to London, which was for 
three months in 1760, Mr. Derrick the poet, who was Gentle- 
man's friend and countryman, flattered me with hopes that he 
would introduce me to Johnson, — an honour of which I was very 
ambitious. But he never found an opportunity ; which made me 
doubt that he had promised to do what was not in his power ; 
till Johnson some years afterwards told me, "Derrick, Sir, 
might very well have introduced you. I had a kindness for 
Derrick, and am sorry he is dead." 

* * - * * * - * * * * 

Mr. Thomas Davies, the actor, who then kept a bookseller's 
shop in Eussell street, Covent Garden, told me that Johnson was 
very much his friend, and came frequently to his house, where 
he more than once invited me to meet him ; but by some unlucky 
accident or other he was prevented from coming to us. 

********* 
At last, on Monday, the 16th of May, when I was sitting in Mr. 
Davies's back parlour, after having drunk tea with him and Mrs. 
Davies, Johnson unexpectedly came into the shop ; and Mr. 
Davies having perceived him, through the glass-door in the room in 
which we were sitting, advancing towards us, — he announced his 
awful approach to me, somewhat in the manner of an actor in the 
part of Horatio, when he addresses Hamlet on the appearance of 
his father's ghost, " Look, my Lord, it comes ! " I found that I 
had a very perfect idea of Johnson's figure, from the portrait of 
him painted by Sir Joshua Eeynolds soon after he had published 
his " Dictionary," in the attitude of sitting in his easy chair in deep 
meditation ; which was the first picture his friend did for him, 
which Sir Joshua very kindly presented to me. Mr. Davies men- 
tioned my name, and respectfully introduced me to him. I was 
much agitated ; and recollecting his prejudice against the Scotch, 
of which I had heard much, I said to Davies, "Don't tell where 
I come from. " — ' ' From Scotland, " cried Davies, roguishly. ' ' Mr. 



316 SELECTIONS. 

Johnson," said I, " I do indeed come from Scotland, but I cannot 
help it. " I am willing to flatter myself that I meant this as light 
pleasantry to soothe and conciliate him, and not as an humiliat- 
ing abasement at the expense of my country. But however that 
might be, this speech was somewhat unlucky ; for with that 
quickness of wit for which he was so remarkable, he seized the 
expression, "come from Scotland," which I used in the sense of 
being of that country ; and, as if I had said that I had come 
away from it, or left it, retorted, "That, Sir, I find, is what a 
very great many of your countrymen cannot help." This stroke 
stunned me a good deal ; and when we had sat down, I felt my- 
self not a little embarrassed, and apprehensive of what might 
come next. He then addressed himself to Davies: "What do 
you think of Garrick ? He has refused me an order for the play 
for Miss Williams, because he knows the house will be full, and 
that an order would be worth three shillings." Eager to take 
any opening to get into conversation with him, I ventured to 
say, "O Sir, I cannot think Mr. Garrick would grudge such a 
trifle to you." "Sir," said he, with a stern look, " I have known 
David Garrick longer than you have done : and I know no right 
you have to talk to me on the subject." Perhaps I deserved this 
check ; for it was rather presumptuous in me, an entire stranger, 
to express any doubt of the justice of his animadversion upon his 
old acquaintance and pupil. I now felt myself much mortified, 
and began to think that the hope which I had long indulged of 
obtaining his acquaintance was blasted. And, in truth, had not 
my ardour been uncommonly strong, and my resolution uncom- 
monly persevering, so rough a reception might have deterred me 
for ever from making any further attempts. Fortunately, how- 
ever, I remained upon the field not wholly discomfited ; and was 
soon rewarded by hearing some of his conversation. 

********* 
I was highly pleased with the extraordinary vigour of his con- 
versation, and regretted that I was drawn away from it by an 
engagement at another place. I had, for a part of the evening, 
been left alone with him, and had ventured to make an observa- 
tion now and then, which he received very civilly ; so that I was 
satisfied that though there was a roughness in his manner, there 
was no ill-nature in his disposition. Davies followed me to the 



JOHNSON. 317 

door, and when I complained to him a little of the hard blows 
which the great man had given me, he kindly took upon him to 
console me by saying, "Don't be uneasy, I can see he likes you 
very well." 

A few days afterwards I called on Davies, and asked him if he 
thought I might take the liberty of waiting on Mr. Johnson at 
his chambers in the Temple. He said I certainly might, and that 
Mr. Johnson would take it as a compliment. So upon Tuesday 
the 24th of May, after having been enlivened by the witty sallies 
of Messieurs Thornton, Wilkes, Churchill, and Lloyd, with whom 
I passed the morning, I boldly repaired to Johnson. His cham- 
bers were on the first floor of No. 1, Inner Temple Lane, and 
I entered them with an impression given me by the Eeverend 
Dr. Blair of Edinburgh, who had been introduced to me not 
long before, and described his having ' ' found the Giant in his 
den ; " an expression which, when I came to be pretty well ac- 
quainted with Johnson, I repeated to him, and he was diverted 
at this picturesque account of himself. Dr. Blair had been pre- 
sented to him by Dr. James Fordyce. At this time the contro- 
versy concerning the pieces published by Mr. James Macpherson, 
as translations of Ossian, was at its height. Johnson had all 
along denied their authenticity ; and, what was still more provok- 
ing to their admirers, maintained that they had no merit. The 
subject having been introduced by Dr. Fordyce, Dr. Blair, rely- 
ing on the internal evidence of their antiquity, asked Dr. Johnson 
whether he thought any man of a modern age could have written 
such poems? Johnson replied, "Yes, Sir, many men, many 
women, and many children." Johnson, at this time, did not 
know that Dr. Blair had just published a Dissertation, not only 
defending their authenticity, but seriously ranking them with the 
poems of Homer and Virgil ; and when he was afterwards in- 
formed of this circumstance, he expressed some displeasure at 
Dr. Fordyce's having suggested the topic, and said, "I am not 
sorry that they got thus much for their pains. Sir, it was like 
leading one to talk of a book, when the author is concealed 
behind the door." 

He received me very courteously ; but it must be confessed, 
that his apartment, and furniture, and morning dress, were suf- 
ficiently uncouth. His brown suit of clothes looked very rusty ; 



318 SELECTIONS. 

he had on a little old shrivelled unpowdered wig, which was too 
small for his head ; his shirt-neck and knees of his breeches were 
loose ; his black worsted stockings ill drawn up ; and he had a 
pair of unbuckled shoes by way of slippers. But all these slov- 
enly particularities were forgotten the moment that he began to 
talk. Some gentlemen, whom I do not recollect, w T ere sitting with 
him ; and when they went away, I also rose ; but he said to me, 
"Nay, don't go." — "Sir," said I, "I am afraid that I intrude 
upon you. It is benevolent to allow me to sit and hear you." 
He seemed pleased with this compliment, which I sincerely paid 
him, and answered, "Sir, I am obliged to any man who visits 
me." 

How Boswell gathered material for the biography is re- 
lated on page 145. The following brief extracts convey 
some notion of his success in reporting the sayings of his 
master. 

Talking of the eminent writers in Queen Anne's reign, he ob- 
served, ' ' I think Dr. Arbuthnot the first man among them. He 
was the most universal genius, being an excellent physician, a 
man of deep learning, and a man of much humour. Mr. Addi- 
son was, to be sure, a great man $ his learning was not profound, 
but his morality, his humour, and his elegance of writing, set him 
very high." 

Mr. Ogilvie was unlucky enough to choose for the topic of his 
conversation the praises of his native country. He began with 
saying, that there was very rich land around Edinburgh. Gold- 
smith, who had studied physic there, contradicted this, very un- 
truly, with a sneering laugh. Disconcerted a little by this, Mr. 
Ogilvie then took a new ground, where, I suppose, he thought 
himself perfectly safe ; for he observed, that Scotland had a great 
many noble wild prospects. Johnson : "I believe, Sir, you have a 
great many. Norway, too, has noble wild prospects ; and Lapland 
is remarkable for prodigious noble wild prospects. But, Sir, let 
me tell you, the noblest prospect which a Scotchman ever sees, is 
the high road that leads him to England ! " This unexpected and 
pointed sally produced a roar of applause. iVfter all, however, 



JOHNSON. 319 

those who admire the rude grandeur of nature cannot deny it to 
Caledonia. 

On Thursday, July 28, we again supped in private at the Turk's 
Head coffee-house. Johnson : ' ' Swift has a higher reputation 
than he deserves. His excellence is strong sense ; for his humour, 
though very well, is not remarkably good. I doubt whether the 
' Tale of a Tub ' be his ; for he never owned it, and it is much 
above his usual manner." 

On Saturday, July 30, Dr. Johnson and I took a sculler at the 
Temple-stairs, and set out for Greenwich. I asked him if he 
really thought a knowledge of the Greek and Latin languages an 
essential requisite to a good education. Johnson: " Most cer- 
tainly, Sir ; for those who know them have a very great advantage 
over those who do not. Nay, Sir, it is wonderful what a differ- 
ence learning makes upon people even in the common intercourse 
of life, which does not appear to be much connected with it." 
"And yet," said I, "people go through the world very well, and 
carry on the business of life to good advantage, without learn- 
ing." Johnson: "Why, Sir, that may be true in cases where 
learning cannot possibly be of any use ; for instance, this boy 
rows us as well without learning as if he could sing the song of 
Orpheus to the Argonauts, who were the first sailors.'' He then 
called to the boy, " What would you give, my lad, to know about 
the Argonauts?" "Sir," said the boy, "I would give what I 
have." Johnson was much pleased with his answer, and we gave 
him a double fare. Dr. Johnson then turning to me, " Sir," said 
he, "a desire of knowledge is the natural feeling of mankind ; 
and every human being whose mind is not debauched, will be 
willing to give all that he has, to get knowledge." 

Talking of a London life, he said, ' ' The happiness of London 
is not to be conceived but by those who have been in it. I will 
venture to say, there is more learning and science within the cir- 
cumference of ten miles from where we now sit, than in all the 
rest of the kingdom." Boswell : " The only disadvantage is the 
great distance at which people live from one another." Johnson : 
" Yes, Sir ; but that is occasioned by the largeness of it, which is 



320 SELECTIONS. 

the cause of all the other advantages. " Boswell : ' ' Sometimes 
I have been in the humour of wishing to retire to a desert." 
Johnson : " Sir, you have desert enough in Scotland." 

I suggested a doubt, that if I were to reside in London, the 
exquisite zest with which I relished it in occasional visits might 
go off, and I might grow tired of it. Johnson : ' ' Why, Sir, you 
find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. 
No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life ; for 
there is in London all that life can afford." 

There was a pretty large circle this evening. Dr. Johnson was 
in very good humour, lively, and ready to talk upon all subjects. 
Mr. Ferguson, the self-taught philosopher, told him of a new- 
invented machine which went without horses : a man who sat in 
it turned a handle, which worked a spring that drove it forward. 
" Then, Sir," said Johnson, "what is gained is, the man has his 
choice whether he will move himself alone, or himself and the 
machine too." Dominicetti being mentioned, he would not 
allow him any merit. "There is nothing in all this boasted 
system. No, Sir ; medicated baths can be no better than warm 
water ; their only effect can be that of tepid moisture." One of 
the company took the other sids, maintaining that medicines of 
various sorts, and some too of most powerful effect, are intro- 
duced into the human frame by the medium of the pores ; and, 
therefore, when warm water is impregnated with salutiferous 
substances, it may produce great effects as a bath. This ap- 
peared to me very satisfactory. Johnson did not answer it ; but 
talking for victory, and determined to be master of the field, he 
had recourse to the device which Goldsmith imputed to him in 
the witty words of one of Cibber's comedies : " There is no argu- 
ing with Johnson ; for when his pistol misses fire, he knocks you 
down with the butt-end of it," He turned to the gentleman, 
"Well, Sir, go to Dominicetti, and get thyself fumigated; but 
be sure that the steam be directed to thy head, for that is the 
peccant party This produced a triumphant roar of laughter 
from the motley assembly of philosophers, printers, and depend- 
ents, male and female. 



BURKE. 321 

After dinner our conversation first turned upon Pope. John- 
son said, his characters of men were admirably drawn, those 
of women not so well. He repeated to us, in his forcible, melo- 
dious manner, the concluding lines of the Dunciad. While 
he was talking loudly in praise of those lines, one of the com- 
pany [Bos well ?] ventured to say, " Too fine for such a poem : — a 
poem on what ? " Johnson (with a disdainful look) : " Why, on 
dunces. It was worth while being a dunce then. Ah, Sir, hadst 
thou lived in those days ! It is not worth while being a dunce 
now, when there are no wits." 



BURKE. 

The first selection is taken from the Reflections on the 
Revolution in France. Burke loved "& manly, moral, 
regulated liberty/' and the liberty which Frenchmen were 
then trying to establish was, in his opinion, far from that 
ideal. The views he sets forth here are consistent with his 
statesmanship. Burke was never willing to look at a sub- 
ject in the abstract ; he must judge of it in all its practical 
bearings. He believed in facts rather than in theories. 
This characteristic is admirably illustrated in the extract 
that follows. 

I flatter myself that I love a manly, moral, regulated liberty as 
well as any gentleman of that Society, be he who he will ; and 
perhaps I have given as good proofs of my attachment to that 
cause, in the whole course of my public conduct. I think I envy 
liberty as little as they do, to any other nation. But I cannot 
stand forward, and give praise or blame to any thing which re- 
lates to human actions, and human concerns, on a simple view of 
the object, as it stands stripped of every relation, in all the naked- 
ness and solitude of metaphysical abstraction. Circumstances 
(which with some gentlemen pass for nothing) give in reality to 
every political principle its distinguishing colour, and discriminat- 
ing effect. The circumstances are what render every civil and 
political scheme beneficial or noxious to mankind. Abstract- 



322 SELECTIONS. 

edly speaking, government, as well as liberty, is good ; yet could 
I, in' common sense, ten years ago, have felicitated France on her 
enjoyment of a government (for she then had a government) 
without inquiry what the nature of that government was, or how 
it was administered ? Can I now congratulate the same nation 
upon its freedom ? Is it because liberty in the abstract may be 
classed amongst the blessings of mankind, that I am seriously to 
felicitate a madman, who has escaped from the protecting re- 
straint and wholesome darkness of his cell, on his restoration 
to the enjoyment of light and liberty ? Am I to congratulate 
a highwayman and murderer, who has broke prison, upon the 
recovery of his natural rights ? This would be to act over again 
the scene of the criminals condemned to the gallies, and their 
heroic deliverer, the metaphysic Knight of the Sorrowful Coun- 
tenance. 

When I see the spirit of liberty in action, I see a strong princi- 
ple at work ; and this, for awhile, is all I can possibly know of it. 
The wild gas, the fixed air, is plainly broke loose : but we ought 
to suspend our judgment until the first effervescence is a little 
subsided, till the liquor is cleared, and until we see something 
deeper than the agitation of a troubled and frothy surface. I 
must be tolerably sure, before I venture publicly to congratulate 
men upon a blessing, that they have really received one. Flat- 
tery corrupts both the receiver and the giver ; and adulation is 
not of more service to the people than to kings. I should there- 
fore suspend my congratulations on the new liberty of France, 
until I was informed how it had been combined with govern- 
ment ; with public force; with the discipline and obedience of 
armies ; with the collection of an effective and well-distributed 
revenue ; with morality and religion ; with the solidity of prop- 
erty ; with peace and order ; with civil and social manners. All 
these (in their way) are good things too ; and, without them, lib- 
erty is not a benefit whilst it lasts, and is not likely to continue 
long. The effect of liberty to individuals is, that they may do 
what they please ; we ought to see what it will please them to do, 
before we risque congratulations, which may be soon turned into 
complaints. Prudence would dictate this in the case of separate 
insulated private men; but liberty, when men act in bodies, is 
power. Considerate people, before they declare themselves, will 



BURKE. 323 

observe the use which is made of power ; and particularly of so 
trying a thing as new power in new persons, of whose principles, 
tempers, and dispositions, they have little or no experience, and 
in situations where those who appear the most stirring in the 
scene may possibly not be the real movers. 

Burke's love of the Past has been referred to. His con- 
servative temper is eloquently expressed in the following 
noble passage from the Reflections on the Revolution in 
France. A young American may with profit compare his 
own notions of liberty with those which he finds set forth 
in these selections from Burke. 

You will observe, that from Magna Charta to the Declaration 
of Right, it has been the uniform policy of our constitution to 
claim and assert our liberties -, as an entailed inheritance derived 
to us from our forefathers, and to be transmitted to our posterity ; 
as an estate specially belonging to the people of this kingdom 
without any reference whatever to any other more general or 
prior right. By this means our constitution preserves an unity in 
so great a diversity of its parts. We have an inheritable crown ; 
an inheritable peerage ; and an house of commons and a people 
inheriting privileges, franchises, and liberties, from a long line of 
ancestors. 

This policy appears to me to be the result of profound reflec- 
tion ; or rather the happy effect of following nature, which is 
wisdom without reflection, and above it. A spirit of innovation 
is generally the result of a selfish temper and confined views. 
People will not look forward to posterity, who never look back- 
ward to their ancestors. Besides, the people of England well 
know, that the idea of inheritance furnishes a sure principle of 
conservation, and a sure principle of transmission ; without at all 
excluding a principle of improvement. It leaves acquisition 
free ; but it secures what it acquires. Whatever advantages are 
obtained by a state proceeding on these maxims, are locked fast 
as in a sort of family settlement ; grasped as in a kind of mort- 
main for ever. By a constitutional policy, working after the 
pattern of nature, we receive, we hold, we transmit our govern- 



324 SELECTIONS. 

ment and our privileges, in the same manner in which we enjoy 
and transmit our property and our lives. The institutions of 
policy, the goods of fortune, the gifts of Providence, are handed 
down, to us and from us, in the same course and order. Our 
political system is placed in a just correspondence and symmetry 
with the order of the world, and with the mode of existence 
decreed to a permanent body composed of transitory parts ; 
wherein, by the disposition of a stupendous wisdom, moulding 
together the great mysterious incorporation of the human race, 
the whole, at one time, is never old, or middle-aged, or young, 
but in a condition of unchangeable constancy, moves on through 
the varied tenour of perpetual decay, fall, renovation, and pro- 
gression. Thus, by preserving the method of nature in the con- 
duct of the state, in what we improve, we are never wholly new ; 
in what we retain we are never wholly obsolete. By adhering in 
this manner and on those principles to our forefathers, we are 
guided not by the superstition of antiquarians, but by the spirit 
of philosophic analogy. In this choice of inheritance we have 
given to our frame of polity the image of a relation in blood ; 
binding up the Constitution of our country with our dearest 
domestic ties ; adopting our fundamental laws into the bosom of 
our family affections ; keeping inseparable, and cherishing with 
the warmth of all their combined and mutually reflected chari- 
ties, our state, our hearths, our sepulchres, and our altars. 

Through the same plan of a conformity to nature in our arti- 
ficial institutions, and by calling in the aid of her unerring and 
powerful instincts, to fortify the fallible and feeble contrivances 
of our reason, we have derived several other, and those no small 
benefits, from considering our liberties in the light of an inherit- 
ance. Always acting as if in the presence of canonized fore- 
fathers, the spirit of freedom, leading in itself to misrule and 
excess, is tempered with an awful gravity. This idea of a liberal 
descent inspires us with a sense of habitual native dignity, which 
prevents that upstart insolence almost inevitably adhering to and 
disgracing those who are the first acquirers of any distinction. 
By this means onr liberty becomes a noble freedom. If carries 
an imposing and majestic aspect. It has a pedigree and illustrat- 
ing ancestors. It has its bearings and its ensigns armorial. It 
has its gallery of portraits ; its monumental inscriptions ; its 



BURKE. 325 

records, evidences, and titles. We procure reverence to our civil 
institutions on the principle upon which nature teaches us to 
revere individual men ; on account of their age, and on account 
of those from whom they are descended. All your sophisters 
cannot produce any thing better adapted to preserve a rational 
and manly freedom than the course that we have pursued, who 
have chosen our nature rather than our speculations, our breasts 
rather than our inventions, for the great conservatories and 
magazines of our rights and privileges. 

The following words of Burke were spoken by him in 
the House of Commons, March 22, 1775. He pleaded for 
Conciliation with America. " The superior power may 
offer peace with honour and with safety/' he argued. 
' ' Magnanimity in politics is not seldom the truest wis- 
dom," was a principle of his statesmanship. Burke's 
noble appeal was of little avail ; for in less than a month 
came the battles of Concord and Lexington — and there 
was fired " the shot heard round the world." 



My hold of the Colonies is in the close affection which grows 
from common names, from kindred blood, from similar privi- 
leges, and equal protection. These are ties, which, though light 
as air, are as strong as links of iron. Let the Colonists always 
keep the idea of their civil rights associated with your govern- 
ment ; — they will cling and grapple to you ; and no force under 
heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance. But 
let it be once understood, that your government may be one thing, 
and their Privileges another ; that these two things may exist 
without any mutual relation ; — the cement is gone ; the cohesion 
is loosened ; and everything hastens to decay and dissolution. 
As long as you have the wisdom to keep the sovereign authority 
of this country as the sanctuary of liberty, the sacred temple 
consecrated to our common faith, wherever the chosen race and 
sons of England worship freedom, they will turn their faces 
towards you. The more they multiply, the more friends you will 
have ; the more ardently they love liberty, the more perfect will 



326 SELECTIONS. 

be their obedience. Slavery they can have anywhere. It is a 
weed that grows in every soil. They may have it from Spain, 
they may have it from Prussia. But, until you become lost to 
all feeling of your true interest and your natural dignity, free- 
dom they can have from none but you. This is the commodity 
of price, of which you have the monopoly. This is the true Act 
of Navigation, which binds to you the commerce of the Colonies, 
and through them secures to you the wealth of the world. Deny 
them this participation of freedom, and you break that sole bond, 
which originally made, and must still preserve, the unity of the 
Empire. Do not entertain so weak an imagination, as that your 
registers and your bonds, your affidavits and your sufferances, 
your cockets and your clearances, are what form the great secu- 
rities of your commerce. Do not dream that your letters of 
office, and your instructions, and your suspending clauses, are 
the things that hold together the great contexture of the myste- 
rious whole. These things do not make your government, Dead 
instruments, passive tools as they are, it is the spirit of the 
English communion that gives all their life and efficacy to them. 
It is the spirit of the English Constitution, which, infused 
through the mighty mass, pervades, feeds, unites, invigorates, 
vivifies every part of the empire, even down to the minutest 
member. 

Is it not the same virtue which does every thing for us here in 
England? Do you imagine, then, that it is the Land-tax Act 
which raises your revenue ? that it is the annual vote in the 
Committee of Supply which gives you your army ? or that it is 
the Mutiny Bill which inspires it with bravery and discipline ? 
No ! surely no ! It is the love of the people ; it is their attach- 
ment to their government, from the sense of the deep stake they 
have in such a glorious institution — which gives you your army 
and your navy, and infuses into both that liberal obedience, with- 
out which your army would be a base rabble, and your navy 
nothing but rotten timber. 

All this, I know well enough, will sound wild and chimerical 
to the profane herd of those vulgar and mechanical politicians 
who have no place among us ; a sort of people who think that 
nothing exists but what is gross and material ; and who there- 
fore, far from being qualified to be directors of the great move- 



GOLDSMITH. 327 

ment of empire, are not fit to turn a wheel in the machine. But 
to men truly initiated and rightly taught, these ruling and mas- 
ter principles, which, in the opinion of such men as I have men- 
tioned, have no substantial existence, are in truth every thing, 
and all in all. Magnanimity in politicks is not seldom the truest 
wisdom ; and a great empire and little minds go ill together. If 
we are conscious of our station, and glow with zeal to fill our 
place as becomes our situation and ourselves, we ought to auspi- 
cate all our public proceedings on America with the old warning 
of the Church, Sursum corcla ! We ought to elevate our minds 
to the greatness of that trust to which the order of Providence 
has called us. By adverting to the dignity of this high calling, 
our ancestors have turned a savage wilderness into a glorious 
empire ; and have made the most extensive and the only honour- 
able conquests, not by destroying, but by promoting the wealth, 
the number, the happiness, of the human race. Let us get an 
American revenue as we have got an American empire. English 
privileges have made it all that it is ; English privileges alone 
will make it all it can be. 



GOLDSMITH. 

Ik a merry company at a London coffee-house, Oliver 
Goldsmith and his friend Garrick were once rallying each 
other, when it was agreed that each should write the 
other's epitaph. Garrick immediately produced the follow- 
ing lines : 

" Here lies Nolly Goldsmith, for shortness calPd Noll, 
Who wrote like an angel, but talk'd like poor Poll." 

"Goldsmith, upon the company's laughing very heart- 
ily/' so Garrick tells us, "grew very thoughtful, and 
either would not or could not write anything at that time ; 
however, he went to work, and some weeks after produced 
the following printed form, called Retaliation. The 
public in general have been mistaken in imagining that 



328 SELECTIONS. 

this poem was written in anger by the Doctor ; it was just 
the contrary ; the whole on all sides was done with the 
greatest good humour." The epitaphs of Burke, Garrick, 
and Sir Joshua Eeynolds are given in the selections : 



Here lies our good Edmund, whose genius was such, 
We scarcely can praise it, or blame it too much ; 
Who, born for the universe, narrow'd his mind, 
And to party gave up what was meant for mankind ; 
Though fraught with all learning, yet straining his throat 
To persuade Tommy Townshend to lend him a vote; 
Who, too deep for his hearers, still went on refining, 
And thought of convincing, while they thought of dining ; 
Though equal to all things, for all things unfit ; 
Too nice for a statesman, too proud for a wit, 
For a patriot too cool, for a drudge disobedient, 
And too fond of the right to pursue the expedient. 
In short 'twas his fate, unemploy'ct, or in place, sir, 
To eat mutton cold, and cut blocks with a razor. 

Here lies David Garrick, describe me who can, 
An abridgment of all that was pleasant in man : 
As an actor, confess' d without rival to shine; 
As a wit, if not first, in the very first line; 
Yet, with talents like these, and an excellent heart, 
The man had his failings, a dupe to his art. 
Like an ill- judging beauty, his colours he spread 
And beplaster'd with rouge his own natural red. 
On the stage he was natural, simple, affecting ; 
'Twas only that when he was off he was acting. 
With no reason on earth to go out of his way, 
He turn'd and he varied full ten times a day. 
Though secure of our hearts, yet confoundedly sicK 
If they were not his own by finessing and trick : 
He cast off his friends, as a huntsman his pack, 
For he knew when he pleas'd he could whistle them back. 
Of praise a mere glutton, he swallow'd what came, 
And the puff of a dunce he mistook it for fame ; 
Till his relish grown callous, almost to disease, 
Who pepper'd the highest was surest to please. 



GOLDSMITH. 329 

But let us be candid, and speak out our mind, 

If dunces applauded, he paid them in kind. 

Ye Kenricks, ye Kellys, ye Woodfalls so grave, 

What a commerce was yours while you got and you gave, 

How did Grub-street re-echo the shouts that you rais'd, 

While he was be-Roscius'd, and you were be-prais'dl 

But peace to his spirit, wherever it flies, 

To act as an angel, and mix with the skies: 

Those poets, who owe their best fame to his skill, 

Shall still be his flatterers, go where he will ; 

Old Shakespeare receive him with praise and with love, 

And Beaumonts and Bens be his Kellys above. 

Here Reynolds is laid, and, to tell you my mind, 
He has not left a wiser or better behind : 
His pencil was striking, resistless, and grand ; 
His manners were gentle, complying, and bland; 
Still born to improve us in every part, 
His pencil our faces, his manners our heart. 
To coxcombs averse, yet most civilly steering, 
When they judg'd without skill he was still hard of hearing; 
When they talk'd of their Raphaels, Correggios, and stuff, 
He shifted his trumpet, and only took snuff. 

The portrait of the school-master, one of the worthies 
of Tlie Deserted Village, is a bit of description in Gold- 
smith's best vein. 

Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way, 
With blossom'd furze unprofitably gay, 
There, in his noisy mansion, skill'd to rule, 
The village master taught his little school. 
A man severe he was, and stern to view ; 
I knew him well, and every truant knew: 
Well had the boding tremblers learn'd to trace 
The day's disasters in his morning face ; 
Full well they laugh'd with counterfeited glee 
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he ; 
Full well the busy whisper, circling round, 
Convey'd the dismal tidings when he frown'd. 



330 SELECTIONS. 

Yet he was kind, or if severe in aught, 
The love he bore to learning was in fault. 
The village all declar'd how much he knew; 
'Twas certain he could write, and cipher too, 
Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage, 
And even the story ran that he could gauge. 
In arguing too, the parson own'd his skill, 
For even though vanquish'd he could argue still ; 
While words of learned length and thundering sound 
Amaz'd the gazing rustics rang'd around; 
And still they gaz'd, and still the wonder .grew 
That one small head could carry all he knew. 



The following selection from The Vicar of Wakefield is, 
to use Goldsmith's own words, " The Description of the 
Family of Wakefield, in which a Kindred Likeness prevails 
as well of Minds as of Persons." 



I was ever of opinion, that the honest man who married and 
brought up a large family did more service than he who con- 
tinued single, and only talked of population. From this motive, 
I had scarce taken orders a year before I began to think seriously 
of matrimony, and chose my wife, as she did her wedding-gown, 
not for a fine glossy surface, but such qualities as would wear 
well. To do her justice, she was a good-natured, notable woman ; 
and as for breeding, there were few country ladies who could 
show more. She could read any English book without much 
spelling ; but for pickling, preserving, and cookery, none could 
excel her. She prided herself also upon being an excellent con- 
triver in housekeeping ; though I could never find that we grew 
richer with all her contrivances. 

However, we loved each other tenderly, and our fondness in- 
creased as we grew old. There was, in fact, nothing that could 
make us angry with the world or each other. We had an ele- 
gant house, situated in a fine country, and a good neighborhood. 
The year was spent in a moral or rural amusement, in visiting our 
rich neighbors, and relieving such as were poor. We had no 
revolutions to fear, nor fatigues to undergo ; all our adventures 



GOLDSMITH. 331 

were by the fireside, and all our migrations from the blue bed to 
r the brown. 

As we lived near the road, we often had the traveller or stranger 
visit us to taste our gooseberry wine, for which we had great 
reputation ; and I profess, with the veracity of an historian, that 
I never knew one of them find fault with it. Our cousins, too, 
even to the fortieth remove, all remembered their affinity, with- 
out any help from the herald's office, and came very frequently 
to see us. Some of them did us no great honor by these claims 
of kindred, as we had the blind, the maimed, and the halt among 
the number. However, my wife always insisted that, as they 
were the same flesh and blood, they should sit with us at the 
same table. So that, if we had not very rich, we generally had 
very happy friends about us ; for this remark will hold good 
through life, that the poorer the guest the better pleased he ever 
is with being treated ; and as some men gaze with admiration at 
the colors of a tulip or the wing of a butterfly, so I was, by nature, 
an admirer of happy human faces. However, when any one of 
our relations was found to be a person of very bad character, a 
troublesome guest, or one we desired to get rid of, upon his leav- 
ing my house I ever took care to lend him a riding-coat or a 
pair of boots, or sometimes an horse of small value, and I always 
had the satisfaction of finding he never came back to return them. 
By this the house was cleared of such as we. did not like ; but 
never was the family of Wakefield known to turn the traveller or 
the poor dependent out of doors. 

Thus we lived several years in a state of much happiness, not 
but that we sometimes had those little rubs which Providence 
sends to enhance the value of its favours. My orchard was often 
robbed by school-boys, and my wife's custards plundered by the 
cats or the children. The squire would sometimes fall asleep in 
the most pathetic parts of my sermon, or his lady return my 
wife's civilities at church with a mutilated courtesy. But we 
soon got over the uneasiness caused by such accidents, and usually 
in three or four days began to wonder how they vexed us. 

My children, the offspring of temperance, as they were edu- 
cated without softness, so they were at once well formed and 
healthy ; my sons hardy and active, my daughters beautiful and 
blooming. When I stood in the midst of the little circle, which 



332 SELECTIONS. 

promised to be the supports of my declining age, I could not avoid 
repeating the famous story of Count Abensberg, who, in Henry 
the Second's progress through Germany, while other courtiers 
came with their treasures, brought his thirty-two children, and 
presented them to his sovereign as the most valuable offering he 
had to bestow. In this manner, though I had but six, I consid- 
ered them as a very valuable present made to my country, and 
consequently looked upon it as my debtor. Our eldest son was 
named George, after his uncle, who left us ten thousand pounds. 
Our second child, a girl, I intended to call after her aunt Gris- 
sel ; but my wife, who had been reading romances, insisted upon 
her being called Olivia. In less than another year we had an- 
other daughter, and now I was determined that Grissel should be 
her name ; but a rich relation taking a fancy to stand godmother, 
the girl was, by her directions, called Sophia ; so that we had two 
romantic names in the family ; but I solemnly protest I had no 
hand in it. Moses was our next, and, after an interval of twelve 
years, we had two sons more. 

It would be fruitless to deny my exultation when I saw my 
little ones about me ; but the vanity and the satisfaction of my 
wife were even greater than mine. "When our visitors would 
say, "Well, upon my word, Mrs. Primrose, you have the finest 
children in the whole country." — "Ay, neighbour," she would 
answer, "they are as heaven made them — handsome enough, if 
they be good enough; for handsome is that handsome does." 
And then she would bid the girls hold up their heads ; who, to 
conceal nothing, were certainly very handsome. Mere outside is 
so very trifling a circumstance with me, that I should scarce have 
remembered to mention it had it not been a general topic of con- 
versation in the country. Olivia, now about eighteen, had that 
luxuriancy of beauty with which painters generally draw Hebe ; 
open, sprightly, and commanding. Sophia's features were not 
so striking at first, but often did more certain execution ; for 
they were soft, modest, and alluring. The one vanquished by a 
single blow, the other by efforts successively repeated. 

The temper of a woman is generally formed from the turn of 
her features ; at least it was so with my daughters. Olivia 
wished for many lovers ; Sophia to secure one. Olivia was often 
affected, from too great a desire to please : Sophia even repressed 



GOLDSMITH. 333 

excellence, from her fears to offend. The one entertained me 
with her vivacity when I was gay ; the other with her sense when 
I was serious. But these qualities were never carried to excess 
in either, and I have often seen them exchange characters for 
a whole day together. A suit of mourning has transformed 
my coquette into a prude, and a new set of ribbons has given 
her younger sister more than natural vivacity. My eldest son 
George was bred at Oxford, as I intended him for one of the 
learned professions. My second boy Moses, whom I designed for 
business, received a sort of miscellaneous education at home. 
But it is needless to attempt describing the particular characters 
of young people that had seen but very little of the world. In 
short, a family likeness prevailed through all; and, properly 
speaking, they had but one character— that of being all equally 
generous, credulous, simple, and inoffensive. 

The excellent Dr. Primrose, having lost the comfortable 
fortune which had maintained his family in dignity and 
ease, was forced to leave his old home and to take up his 
abode in a humble cottage on the estate of Squire Thorn- 
hill. The young Squire became a frequent visitor at the 
•Vicar's house. He was warmly welcomed by the simple 
Mrs. Primrose, who hoped to secure him as a husband for 
her beautiful daughter Olivia. 

Whatever might have been Sophia's sensations, the rest of the 
family were easily consoled for Mr. Burchell's absence by the 
company of our landlord, whose visits now became more frequent, 
and longer. Though he had been disappointed in procuring my 
daughters the amusements of the town, as he designed, he took 
every opportunity of supplying them with those little recreations 
which our retirement would admit of. He usually came in the 
morning ; and while my son and I followed our occupations 
abroad, he sat with the family at home, and amused them by 
describing the town, with every part of which he was particularly 
acquainted. He could repeat all the observations that were re- 
tailed in the atmosphere of the playhouses, and had all the good 
things of the high wits by rote, long before they made their way 



334 SELECTIONS. 

into the jest-books. The intervals between conversation were 
employed in teaching my daughters piquet, or sometimes in 
setting my two little ones to box, to make them sharp, as he 
called it : but the hopes of having him for a son-in-law in some 
measure blinded us to all his imperfections. It must be owned, 
that my wife laid a thousand schemes to entrap him ; or, to speak 
more tenderly, used every art to magnify the merit of her 
daughter. If the cakes at tea ate short and crisp, they were 
made by Olivia ; if the gooseberry wine was well knit, the goose- 
berries were of her gathering : it was her fingers which gave the 
pickles their peculiar green ; and, in the composition of a pudding, 
it was her judgment that mixed the ingredients. Then the poor 
woman would sometimes tell the squire, that she thought him 
and Olivia extremely of a size, and would bid both stand up, to 
see which was tallest. These instances of cunning, which she 
thought impenetrable, yet which everybody saw through, were 
very pleasing to our benefactor, who gave every day some new 
proofs of his passion, which, though they had not arisen to pro- 
posals of marriage, yet we thought fell but little short of it ; and 
his slowness was attributed sometimes to native bashfulness, and 
sometimes to his fear of offending his uncle. An occurrence, 
however, which happened soon after, put it beyond a doubt that 
he designed to become one of our family ; my wife even regarded 
it as an absolute promise. 

• My wife and daughters happening to return a visit at neighbour 
Flamborough's, found that family had lately got their pictures 
drawn by a limner, who travelled the country, and took like- 
nesses for fifteen shillings a head. As this family and ours had 
long a sort of rivalry in point of taste, our spirit took the alarm 
at this stolen march upon us ; and, notwithstanding all I could 
say, and I said much, it was resolved that we should have our 
pictures done too. 

Having, therefore, engaged the limner,— for what could I 
do?— our next deliberation was to show the superiority of our 
taste in the attitudes. As for our neighbour's family, there 
were seven of them, and they were drawn with seven oranges,— a 
thing quite out of taste, no variety in life, no composition in the 
world. We desired to have something in a brighter style ; and, 
after many debates, at length came to a unanimous resolution of 



GOLDSMITH. 335 

being drawn together, in one large historical family-piece. This 
would be cheaper, since one frame would serve for all, and it 
would be infinitely more genteel ; for all families of any taste 
were now drawn in the same manner. As we did not immediately 
recollect an historical subject to hit us, we were contented each 
with being drawn as independent historical figures. My wife de- 
sired to be represented as Venus, and the painter was requested 
not to be too frugal of his diamonds in her stomacher and hair. 
Her two little ones were to be as Cupids by her side ; while I, in 
my gown and band, was to present her with my books on the 
Whistonian controversy. Olivia would be drawn as an Amazon, 
sitting upon a bank of flowers, dressed in a green Joseph, richly 
laced with gold, and a whip in her hand. Sophia was to be a 
shepherdess, with as many sheep as the painter could put in for 
nothing ; and Moses was to be dressed out with a hat and white 
feather. 

Our taste so much pleased the squire, that he insisted on being 
put in as one of the family, in the character of Alexander the 
Great, at Olivia's feet. This was considered by us all as an indi- 
cation of his desire to be introduced into the family, nor could 
we refuse his request. The painter was therefore set to work, 
and, as he wrought with assiduity and expedition, in less than 
four days the whole was completed. The piece was large, and it 
must be owned he did not spare his colors ; for which my wife 
gave him great encomiums. We were all perfectly satisfied with 
his performance; but an unfortunate circumstance, which had 
not occurred till the picture was finished, now struck us with dis- 
may. It was so very large, that we had no place in the house to 
fix it. How we all came to disregard so material a point is incon- 
ceivable ; but certain it is, we had all been greatly remiss. The 
picture, therefore, instead of gratifying our vanity, as we hoped, 
leaned in a most mortifying manner against the kitchen wall, 
where the canvas was stretched and painted, much too large to 
be got through any of the doors, and the jest of all our neighbors. 
One compared it to Robinson Crusoe's long-boat, too large to be 
removed ; another thought it more resembled a reel in a bottle : 
some wondered how it could be got out, but still more were 
amazed how it ever got in. 



336 SELECTIONS. 



GIBBON. 

The two extracts from The Decline and Fall of the Roman 
Empire present the characters of Charlemagne and of Ma- 
homet. These selections illustrate the weight and value of 
Gibbon's judgment, and his clear and apt, though somewhat 
ponderous expression. 

CHARLEMAGNE. 

The appellation of Great has been often bestowed, and some- 
times deserved, but Charlemagne is the only prince in whose 
favor the title has been indissolubly blended with the name. 
That name, with the addition of saint, is inserted in the Roman 
calendar ; and the saint, by a rare felicity, is crowned with the 
praises of the historians and philosophers of an enlightened age. 
His real merit is doubtless enhanced by the barbarism of the 
nation and the times from which he emerged : but the apparent 
magnitude of an object is likewise enlarged by an unequal com- 
parison ; and the ruins of Palmyra derive a casual splendor from 
the nakedness of the surrounding desert. Without injustice to 
his fame I may discern some blemishes in the sanctity and great- 
ness of the restorer of the western empire. * * * * 
I shall be scarcely permitted to accuse the ambition of a con- 
queror ; but in a day of equal retribution, the sons of his brother 
Carloman, the Merovingian princes of Aquitain, and the four 
thousand five hundred Saxons who were beheaded on the same 
spot, would have something to allege against the justice and 
humanity of Charlemagne. His treatment of the vanquished 
Saxons was an abuse of the right of conquest : his laws were not 
less sanguinary than his arms, and in the discussion of his 
motives, whatever is subtracted from bigotry must be imputed 
to temper. The sedentary reader is amazed by his incessant 
activity of mind and body ; and his subjects and enemies were 
not less astonished at his sudden presence, at the moment when 
they believed him at the most distant extremity of the empire ; 
neither peace nor war, nor summer nor winter, were a season of 



GIBBON. 337 

repose ; and our fancy cannot easily reconcile the annals of his 
reign with the geography of his expeditions. But this activity 
was a national, rather than a personal, virtue ; the vagrant life 
of a Frank was spent in the chase, in pilgrimage, in military 
adventures ; and the journeys of Charlemagne were distinguished 
only by a more numerous train and a more important purpose. 
* * * * I touch with reverence the .laws of Charle- 
magne, so highly applauded by a respectable judge. They com- 
pose not a system, but a series, of occasional and minute edicts, 
for the correction of abuses, the reformation of manners, the 
economy of his farms, the care of his poultry, and even the sale 
of his eggs. He wished to improve the laws and the character of 
the Franks ; and his attempts, however feeble and imperfect, are 
deserving of praise : the inveterate evils of the times were sus- 
pended or mollified by his government ; but in his institutions I 
can seldom discover the general views and the immortal spirit of 
a legislator, who survives himself for the benefit of posterity. 
The union and stability of his empire depended on the life of a 
single man : he imitated the dangerous practice of dividing his 
kingdoms amongst his sons ; and, after his numerous diets, the 
whole constitution was left to fluctuate between the disorders of 
anarchy and despotism. His esteem for the piety and knowledge 
of the clergy tempted him to intrust that aspiring order with 
temporal dominion and civil jurisdiction ; and his son Lewis, 
when he was stripped and degraded by the bishops, might accuse, 
in some measure, the imprudence of his father. His laws en- 
forced the imposition of tithes, because the demons had pro- 
claimed in the air that the default of payment had been the 
cause of the last scarcity. 

The literary merits of Charlemagne are attested by the foun- 
dation of schools, the introduction of arts, the works which were 
published in his name, and his familiar connection with the sub- 
jects and strangers whom he invited to his court to educate both 
the prince and the people. His own studies were tardy, laborious, 
and imperfect ; if he spoke Latin and understood Greek, he derived 
the rudiments of knowledge from conversation, rather than from 
books : and in his mature age the emperor strove to acquire the 
practice of writing, which every peasant now learns in his in- 
fancy. The grammar and logic, the music and astronomy, of the 



338 SELECTIONS. 

times, were only cultivated as the handmaids of superstition ; 
but the curiosity of the human mind must ultimately tend to its 
improvement, and the encouragement of learning reflects the 
purest and most pleasing lustre on the character of Charlemagne. 
The dignity of his person, the length of his reign, the prosperity 
of his arms, the vigor of his government, and the reverence of 
distant nations, distinguish him from the royal crowd ; and 
Europe dates a new era from his restoration of the western 
empire. 

MAHOMET. 

According to the tradition of his companions, Mahomet was 
distinguished by the beauty of his person, an outward gift which 
is seldom despised, except by those to whom it has been refused. 
Before he spoke, the orator engaged on his side the affections of 
a public or private audience. They applauded his commanding 
presence, his majestic aspect, his piercing eye, his gracious smile, 
his flowing beard, his countenance that painted every sensation 
of the soul, and his gestures that enforced each expression of the 
tongue. In the familiar offices of life he scrupulously adhered 
to the grave and ceremonious politeness of his country : his re- 
spectful attention to the rich and powerful was dignified by his 
condescension and affability to the poorest citizens of Mecca : the 
frankness of his manner concealed the artifice of his views ; and 
the habits of courtesy were imputed to personal friendship or 
universal benevolence. His memory was capacious and retentive ; 
his wit easy and social, his imagination sublime ; his judgment 
clear, rapid, and decisive. He possessed the courage both of 
thought and action ; and, although his designs might gradually 
expand with his success, the first idea which he entertained of 
his divine mission bears the stamp of an original and superior 
genius. The son of Abdallah was educated in the bosom of the 
noblest race, in the use of the purest dialect of Arabia ; and the 
fluency of his speech was corrected and enhanced by the practice 
of discreet and seasonable silence. With these powers of elo- 
quence, Mahomet was an illiterate Barbarian : his youth had 
never been instructed in the arts of reading and writing ; the 
common ignorance exempted him from shame or reproach, but 



burns. 339 

he was reduced to a narrow circle of existence, and deprived of 
those faithful mirrors, which reflect to our mind the minds of 
sages and heroes. Yet the book of nature and of man was open 
to his view ; and some fancy has been indulged in the political 
and philosophical observations which are ascribed to the Arabian 
traveller. He compares the nations and religions of the earth ; 
discovers the weakness of the Persian and Koman monarchies ; 
beholds, with pity and indignation, the degeneracy of the times ; 
and resolves to unite under one God and one king, the in- 
vincible spirit and primitive virtues of the Arabs. Our more 
accurate inquiry will suggest, that, instead of visiting the courts, 
the camps, the temples of the East, the two journeys of Mahomet 
into Syria were confined to the fairs of Bostra and Damascus ; 
that he was only thirteen years of age when he accompanied the 
caravan of his uncle ; and that his duty compelled him to return 
as soon as he had disposed of the merchandise of Cadijah. In 
these hasty and superficial excursions, the eye of genius might 
discern some objects invisible to his grosser companions ; some 
seeds of knowledge might be cast upon a fruitful soil ; but his 
ignorance of the Syriac language must have checked his curios- 
ity ; and I cannot perceive in the life or writings of Mahomet, 
that his prospect was far extended beyond the limits of the 
Arabian world. 

BURNS. 

The following poem has been mentioned on page 174. 
Burns has put into ringing, defiant verse his proud self- 
respect and intense democratic spirit. A Man's a Man 
for a' That reveals the personal temper of the man, and 
also the influence of the time in which he lived : 

A MAN'S A MAN FOR A' THAT. 

Is there, for honest Poverty, 

That hings his head, an' a' that? 
The coward-slave — we pass him by, 

We dare be poor for a' that J 



340 SELECTIONS. 

For a' that, an' a' that. 

Our toils obscure an' a' that, 

The rank is but the guinea stamp, 
The Man's the gowd for a' that. 

What though on namely fare we dine, 

Wear hoddin grey, an' a' that ; 
Gie fools their silks, and knaves their wine, 
A Man's a Man, for a' that : 
For a' that, an' a' that, 

Their tinsel show, an' a' that; 
The honest man, tho' e'er sae poor, 
Is king o' men, for a' that. 

Ye see yon birkie ca'd "a lord," 

Wha struts, an' stares, and a' that ; 
Tho' hundreds worship at his word, 
He's but a coof , for a' that : 
For a' that, and a' that, 

His ribband, star, an' a' that, 
The man o' independent mind, 
He looks an' laughs at a' that. 

A prince can mak a belted knight, 

A marquis, duke, an' a' that ; 
But an honest man's aboon his might, 
Gude faith, he mauna fa' that ! 
For a' that, an' a' that, 

Their dignities an' a' that ; 
The pith o' sense, an' pride o' worth, 
Are higher rank than a' that. 

Then let us pray that come it may, 

(As come it will for a' that,) 
That Sense and Worth, o'er a' the earth, 
May bear the gree, an' a' that ; 
For a' that, an' a' that, 

It's coming yet, for a' that, 

The Man to Man, the world o'er, 

Shall brothers be for a' that. 



B U B K S . 341 

The same fire animates the spirited poem that follows : 

ROBERT BRUCE'S MARCH TO BANNOCKBURN. 

Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled, 
Scots, wham Bruce has aften led, 
Welcome to your gory bed, 
Or to victorie. 

Now's the day, and now's the hour ; 
See the front o' battle lour ; 
See approach proud Edward's power — 
Chains and Slaverie ! 

Wha will be a traitor knave? 
Wha can fill a coward's grave? 
Wha sae base as be a Slave? 
Let him turn and flee ! 

Wha, for Scotland's King and Law 
Freedom's sword will strongly draw, 
Freeman stand, or Freeman fa', 
Let him on wi' me! 

By Oppression's woes and pains! 

By your Sons in servile chains ! 

We will drain our dearest veins, 

But they shall be free! 

Lay the proud usurpers low ! 
Tyrants fall in every foe ! 
Liberty's in every blow ! 
Let us do — or die ! ! ! 

Burns was a poet of many moods. The humor, arch- 
ness, and grace of the following poem are inimitable : 

TAM GLEN- 

My heart is a breaking, dear Tittie, 

Some counsel unto me come len', 
To anger them a' is a pity. 

But what will I do wi' Tarn G-len? 



342 SELECTIOKS. 

I'm thinking, wi' sic a braw fellow, 
In poortith I might make a fen' ; 

What care 1 in riches to wallow, 
If I maunna marry Tarn Glen? 

There's Lowrie the laird o' Drumeller — 
" Guid day to you " — brute! he comes ben: 

He brags and he blaws o' his siller, 
But when will he dance like Tarn Glen? 

My Minnie does constantly deave me r 
And bids me beware o' young men; 

They flatter, she says, to deceive me, 
But wha can think sae o' Tarn Glen! 

My daddie says, gin I'll forsake him, 
He'll gie me gude hunder marks ten; 

But, if it's ordain'd I maun tak him, 
wha will I get but Tarn Glen? 

Yestreen at the Valentine's dealing, 
My heart to my mou gied a sten ; 

For thrice I drew ane without failing, 
And thrice it was written " Tarn Glen! " 

The last Halloween I was waukin 
My droukit sark-sleeve, as ye k^en, 

His likeness cam up the house staukin, 
In the very gray breeks o' Tarn Glen. 

Some counsel, dear Tittie, don't tarry; 

I'll gie ye my bonie black hen, 
Gif ye will advise me to marry 

The lad I lo'e dearly, Tarn Glen, 



The love songs of Burns, so simple, direct, and "heart- 
warm," are the poems that appeal most strongly to his 
readers. Of the following little poem, Burns himself said 
that he reckoned it one of his best songs. 



BUKKS. 343 



WILT THOU BE MY DEARIE? 

Wilt thou be my Dearie? 

When Sorrow wrings thy gentle heart, 
wilt thou let me cheer thee ! 

By the treasure of my soul, 
That's the love I bear thee : 

I swear and vow that only thou 
Shall ever be my Dearie ! 

Only thou, I swear and vow, 
Shall ever be my Dearie ! 

Lassie, say thou lo'es me ; 

Or, if thou wilt na be my ain, 
Say na thou'lt refuse me! 

If it winna, canna be, 
Thou for thine may choose me, 

Let me, lassie, quickly die, 
Still trusting that thou lo'es me ! 

Lassie, let me quickly die, 
Still trusting that thou lo'es me I 



The BirTcs of Aberfeldy is one of the many poems in 
which Burns links together a little love story and pretty 
ont-door scenes. 



THE BIRKS OF ABERFELDY. 

Chor. — Bonie lassie, will ye go, 
Will ye go, will ye go, 
Bonie lassie, will ye go 

To the birks of Aberfeldy! 

Now Simmer blinks on flowery braes, 
And o'er the crystal streamlets plays ; 
Come let us spend the lightsome days, 
In the birks of Aberfeldy. 

Bonie lassie, &c. 



344 SELECTIONS. 

The little birdies blythely sing, 
While o'er their heads the hazels hing, 
Or lightly flit on wanton wing, 
In the birks of Aberfeldy. 

Bonie lassie, &e. 

The braes ascend like lofty wa's, 
The foamy stream deep -roaring fa's, 
O'erhung wi' fragrant spreading shaws- 
The birks of Aberfeldy. 

Bonie lassie, &c. 

The hoary cliffs are crown 'd wi' flowers, 
White o'er the linns the burnie pours, 
And rising, weets wi' misty show'rs 
The birks of Aberfeldy. 

Bonie lassie, &c. 

Let Fortune's gifts at random flee, 
They ne'er shall draw a wish frae me, 
Supremely blest wi' love and thee, . 
In the birks of Aberfeldy. 

Bonie lassie, &c. 



The next song is remarkable for its tenderness and its 
pathetic music. Mendelssohn composed a melody for 
these words. 



O WERT THOU IN THE CAULD BLAST, 

wert thou in the cauld blast, 

On yonder lea, on yonder lea, 
My plaidie to the angry airt, 

I'd shelter thee, I'd shelter thee ; 
Or did Misfortune's bitter storms 

Around thee blaw, around thee blaw, 
Thy bield should be my bosom, 

To share it a', to share it a'. 



BURKS. 345 

Or were I in the wildest waste, 

Sae black and bare, sae black and bare, 
The desert were a Paradise, 

If thou wert there, if thou wert there. 
Or were I Monarch o' the globe, 

Wi' thee to reign, wi' thee to reign, 
The brightest jewel in my crown, 

Wad be my queen, wad be my queen. 

The next song is a favorite. The "Jean," in whose 
honor it was composed, was Jean Armour, whom Burns 
married. 

OF A' THE AIRTS THE WIND CAN BLAW. 

Of a' the airts the wind can blaw, 

I dearly like the west, 
For there the bonie lassie lives, 

The lassie I lo'e best : 
There wild-woods grow, and rivers row, 

And mony a hill between ; 
By day and night my fancy's flight 

Is ever wi' my Jean. 

I see her in the dewy flowers, 

I see her sweet and fair ; 
1 hear her in the tunef u' birds, 

I hear her charm the air; 
There's not a bonie flower that springs 

By fountain, shaw, or green ; 
There's not a bonie bird that sings, 

But minds me o' my Jean. 

The following brief extracts are characteristic stanzas of 
Burns: 

The Muse, nae poet ever fand her, 
Till by himsel' he learn'd to wander, . 
Adown some trottin' burn's meander, 

An' no think lang: 
O sweet to stray, an' pensive ponder 
A heart-felt sang ! 

Epistle to William Simson. 



346 SELECTIONS. 

Some rhyme a neibor's name to lash ; 

Some rhyme (vain thought!) for needfu' cash; 

Some rhyme to court the countra clash ; 

An' raise a din ; 
For me, an aim I never fash ; 

I rhyme for fun ! 

Epistle to James Smith. 

Auld comrade dear, and brither sinner, 
How's a' the folk about Glenconnor? 
How do you this blae eastlin wind, 
That's like to blaw a body blind? 
For me, my faculties are frozen. 

** *J* H* *T* *K W 7T 

But first, before you see heaven's glory 5 
May ye get mony a merry story, 
Mony a laugh and mony a drink, 
An' ay eneugh o' needfu' clink. 

Now fare ye weel, an' joy be wi' you; 
For my sake, this I beg it o' you, 
Assist poor Simson a' ye can, 
Ye'll fin' him just an honest man ; 
Sae I conclude, and quat my chanter, 
Yours, saint or sinner, Rob the Ranter. 

Epistle to James Tennant. 

Say, was thy little mate unkind, 
And heard thee as the careless wind? 
Oh, nocht but love and sorrow join'd, 

Sic notes o' woe could wauken! 
Thou tells o' never-ending care ; 
0' speechless grief, and dark despair: 
For pity's sake, sweet bird, nae mair! 

Or my poor heart is broken. 

Address to the Woodlark. 

Then gently scan your brother man, 

Still gentler sister woman ; 
Tho' they may gang a kennin' wrang, 

To step aside is human : 



BURKS. 347 

One point must still be greatly dark, 

The moving Wliy they do it; 
And just as lamely can ye mark, 

How far perhaps they rue it. 

Who made the heart, 'tis He alone 

Decidedly can try us ; 
He knows each chord, its various tone, 

Each spring, its various bias : 
Then at the balance let's be mute, 

We never can adjust it; 
What's done we partly may compute, 

But know not what's resisted. 

Address to the Unco Guid. 

wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us 

To see oursel as ithers see us ! 

It wad frae monie a blunder free us, 

An' foolish notion ; 
What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us, 

An' ev'n Devotion! 

To a Louse. 

I am naebody's lord, 
I'll be slave to naebody ; 
I hae a gude braid sword, 
L'll take dunts frae naebody. 

I'll be merry and free, 

I'll be sad for naebody ; 
Naebody cares for me, 

I care for naebody. 

J Hae a Wife o' my Ain. 



348 SELECTIONS. 



SCOTT. 

The following passage from TJie Lady of the Lake illus- 
trates what has been said of the poem on page 184. We 
find here the richness of color which Ruskin pronounces 
one of the chief beauties of Scott's description. Every 
traveler who has visited Loch Katrine will answer for the 
exquisite faithfulness of these pictures. 

The western waves of ebbing day 
Rolled o'er the glen their level way; 
Each purple peak, each flinty spire, 
Was bathed in floods of living fire. 
But not a setting beam could glow 
Within the dark ravines below, 
Where twined the path in shadow hid, 
Round many a rocky pyramid, 
Shooting abruptly from the dell 
Its thunder-splintered pinnacle ; 
Round many an insulated mass, 
The native bulwarks of the pass, 
Huge as the towers which builders vain 
Presumptuous piled on Shinar's plain. 
The rocky summits, split and rent, 
Formed turret, dome, or battlement, 
Or seemed fantastically set 
With cupola or minaret, 
Wild crests as pagod ever decked, 
Or mosque of Eastern architect. 
Nor were these earth-born castles bare, 
Nor lacked they many a banner fair ; 
For, from their shivered brows displayed, 
Far o'er the unfathomable glade, 
All twinkling with the dew-drops' sheen, 
The brier-rose fell in streamers green, 
And creeping shrubs, of thousand dyes, 
Waved in the west-wind's summer sighs. 



scott. 349 

Boon nature scattered, free and wild, 
Each plant or flower, the mountain's child. 
Here eglantine embalmed the air, 
Hawthorn and hazel mingled there ; 
The primrose pale and violet flower, 
Found in each cliff a narrow bower ; 
Foxglove and nightshade, side by side, 
Emblems of punishment and pride, 
Grouped their dark hues with every stain 
The weather-beaten crags retain, 
With boughs that quaked at every breath, 
Grey birch and aspen wept beneath ; 
Aloft, the ash and warrior oak 
Cast anchor in the rifted rock ; 
And, higher yet, the pine tree hung 
His shattered trunk, and frequent flung, 
Where seemed the cliffs to meet on high, 
His bows athwart the narrowed sky. 
Highest of all, where white peaks glanced, 
Where glistening streamers waved and danced, 
The wanderer's eye could barely view 
The summer heaven's delicious blue ; 
So wondrous wild, the whole might seem 
The scenery of a fairy dream. 

Onward, amid the copse 'gan peep 
A narrow inlet, still and deep, 
Affording scarce such breadth of brim, 
As served the wild-duck's brood to swim. 
Lost for a space, through thickets veering, 
But broader when again appearing, 
Tall rocks and tufted knolls their face 
Could on the dark-blue mirror trace ; 
And farther as the hunter strayed, 
Still broader sweep its channels made. 
The shaggy mounds no longer stood, 
Emerging from entangled wood, 
But, wave-encircled, seemed to float, 
Like castle girdled with its moat ; 
Yet broader floods extending still 
Divide them from their parent hill, 



350 SELECTIONS. 

Till each, retiring, claims to be 
An islet in an inland sea. 

And now, to issue from the glen, 

No pathway meets the wanderer's ken, 

Unless he climb, with footing nice, 

A far projecting precipice. 

The broom's tough roots his ladder made, 

The hazel saplings lent their aid ; 

And thus an airy point he won, 

Where, gleaming with the setting sun, 

One burnished sheet of living gold, 

Loch Katrine lay beneath him rolled, 

In all her length far winding lay, 

With promontory, creek, and bay, 

And islands that, empurpled bright, 

Floated amid the livelier light, 

And mountains, that like giants stand, 

To sentinel enchanted land. 

High on the south, huge Benvenue 

Down on the lake in masses threw 

Crags, knolls, and mounds, confusedly hurled, 

The fragments of an earlier world ; 

A wildering forest feathered o'er 

His ruined sides and summit hoar, 

While on the north, through middle air, 

Ben-an heaved high his forehead bare. 

The Lady of the Lake, Canto I. 

The following selection from Marmion shows the other 
marked characteristic of the poet Scott : his spirited and 
picturesque narrative verse. The battle of Flodden took 
place in 1513, and resulted in the overwhelming defeat 
of the Scotch and the loss of the best blood of their 
nation. The Marmion of Scott's poem is a fictitious char- 
acter. The famous critic, Jeffrey, said of this passage : 
" Of all the poetical battles which have been fought, from 
the days of Homer to those of Mr. Southey, there is none, 
in our opinion, at all comparable, for interest and anima- 
tion, — for breadth of drawing and magnificence of effect, — 






SCOTT. 351 

with this of Mr. Scott's." A more recent and critical 
comparison of Homer and Scott may be found in Matthew 
Arnold's lectures " On Translating Homer." 

Blount and Fitz-Eustace rested still 
With Lady Clare upon the hill, 
On which — for far the day was spent — 
The western sunbeams now were bent ; 
The cry they heard, its meaning knew, 
Could plain their distant comrades view: 
Sadly to Blount did Eustace say, 
" Unworthy office here to stay! 
No hope of gilded spurs to-day. — 
But see ! look up — on Flodden bent 
The Scottish foe has fired his tent." 

And sudden, as he spoke, 
From the sharp ridges of the hill, 
All downward to the banks of Till, 

Was wreathed in sable smoke. 
Volumed and vast, and rolling far, 
The cloud enveloped Scotland's war 

As down the hill they broke ; 
Nor martial shout, nor minstrel tone, 
Announced their march ; their tread alone, 
At times one warning trumpet blown, 

At times a stifled hum, 
Told England, from his mountain-throne 

King James did rushing come. 
Scarce could they hear or see their foes 
Until at weapon-point they close. — 
They close in clouds of smoke and dust, 
With sword-sway and with lance's thrust; 

And such a yell was there, 

Of sudden and portentous birth, 

- As if men fought upon the earth, 

And fiends in upper air ; 
Oh! life and death were in the shout, 
Recoil- and rally, charge and rout, 

And triumph and despair. 
Long looked the anxious squires ; their eye 
Could in the darkness nought descry. 



352 SELECTIONS. 

At length the freshening western blast 

Aside the shroud of battle cast ; 

And first the ridge of mingled spears 

Above the brightening cloud appears, 

And in the smoke the pennons flew, 

As in the storm the white seamew. 

Then marked they, dashing broad and far, 

The broken billows of the war, 

And plumed crests of chieftains brave 

Floating like foam upon the wave ; 

But nought distinct they see: 
Wide raged the battle on the plain ; 
Spears shook and falchions flashed amain; 
Fell England's arrow-flight like rain ; 
Crests rose, and stooped, and rose again, 

Wild and disorderly. 
Amid the scene of tumult, high 
They saw Lord Marmion's falcon fly ; 
And stainless Tunstall's banner white, 
And Edmund Howard's lion bright, 
Still bear them bravely in the fight, 

Although against them come 
Of gallant Gordons many a one, 
And many a stubborn Badenoch-man, 
And many a rugged Border clan, 

With Huntly and with Home. 

Far on the left, unseen the while, 
Stanley broke Lennox and Argyle, 
Though there the western mountaineer 
Rushed with bare bosom on the spear, 
And flung the feeble targe aside, 
And with both hands the broadsword plied. 
'Twas vain. — But Fortune, on the right, 
With fickle smile cheered Scotland's fight. 
Then fell that spotless banner white, 

The Howard's lion fell; 
Yet still Lord Marmion's falcon flew 
With wavering flight, while fiercer grew 

Around the battle-yell. 



SCOTT. 353 

The Border slogan rent the sky ! 
A Home! A Gordon! was the cry: 

Loud were the clanging blows ; 
Advanced, — forced back, — now low, now high, 

The pennon sunk and rose ; 
As bends the bark's mast in the gale, 
When rent are rigging, shrouds, and sail, 

It wavered 'mid the foes. 
No longer Blount the view could bear: 
"By heaven and all its saints! I swear 

I will not see it lost ! 
Fitz-Eustace, you with Lady Clare 
May bid your beads and patter prayer, — 

I gallop to the host." 
And to the fray he rode amain, 
Followed by all the archer train. 
The fiery youth, with desperate charge, 
Made for a space an opening large, — 

The rescued banner rose, — 
But darkly closed the war around, 
Like pine-tree rooted from the ground 

It sank among the foes. 
Then Eustace mounted too, —yet stayed, 
As loath to leave the helpless maid, 

When, fast as shaft can fly, 
Bloodshot his eyes, his nostrils spread, 
The loose rein dangling from his head, 
Housing and saddle bloody red, 

Lord Marmion's steed rushed by; 
And Eustace, maddening at the sight, 

A look and sign to Clara cast 

To mark he would return in haste, 
Then plunged into the fight. 

Ask me not what the maiden feels, 

Left in that dreadful hour alone: 
Perchance her reason stoops or reels; 

Perchance a courage, not her own, 

Braces her mind to desperate tone. — 
The scattered van of England wheels ; — 



354 SELECTIONS. 

She only said, as loud in air 
The tumult roared, " Is Wilton there?" 
They fly, or, maddened by despair, 
Fight but to die,—" Is Wilton there?" 
With that, straight up the hill there rode 

Two horsemen drenched with gore, 
And in their arms, a helpless load, 

A wounded knight they bore. 
His hand still strained the broken brand; 
His arms were smeared with blood and sand. 
Dragged from among the horses' feet, 
With dinted shield and helmet beat, 
The falcon-crest and plumage gone, 
Can that be haughty Marmion ! . . . 
Young Blount his armor did unlace, 
And, gazing on his ghastly face, 

Said, ' ' By Saint George, he's gone ! 
That spear-wound has our master sped, 
And see the deep cut on his head ! 

Good-night to Marmion." — 
" Unnurtured Blount! thy brawling cease: 
He opes his eyes," said Eustace; "peace! " 

When, doffed his casque, he felt free air, 

Around 'gan Marmion wildly stare: 

"Where's Harry Blount ? Fitz-Eustace where ? 

Linger ye here, ye hearts of hare ! 

Redeem my pennon, — charge again! 

Cry, ' Marmion to the rescue! ' — Vain! 

Last of my race, on battle-plain 

That shout shall ne'er be heard again ! — 

Yet my last thought is England's— fly, 

To Dacre bear my signet-ring; 

Tell him his squadrons up to bring.— 
Fitz-Eustace, to Lord Surrey hie: 

Tunstall lies dead upon the field, 

His lifeblood stains the spotless shield; 

Edmund is down ; my life is reft ; 

The Admiral alone is left. 

Let Stanley charge with spur of fire, — 

With Chester charge, and Lancashire, 



scott. 355 

Full upon Scotland's central host, 
Or victory and England's lost. — 
Must I bid twice ? — hence, varlets ! fly ! — 
Leave Marmion here alone — to die." 

The war, that for a space did fail, 
Now trebly thundering swelled the gale, 

And " Stanley!" was the cry. — 
A light on Marmion's visage spread, 

And fired his glazing eye ; 
With dying hand above his head 
He shook the fragment of his blade, 

And shouted " Victory ! — 
Charge, Chester, charge! On, Stanley, on!" 
Were the last words of Marmion. 

By this, though deep the evening fell, 
Still rose the battle's deadly swell, 
For still the Scots around their king, 
Unbroken, fought in desperate ring. 

: # # * * * * 

But as they left the darkening heath 
More desperate grew the strife of death. 
The English shafts in volleys hailed, 
In headlong charge their horse assailed ; 
Front, flank, and rear, the squadrons sweep 
To break the Scottish circle deep 

That fought around their king. 
But yet, though thick the shafts as snow, 
Though charging knights like whirlwinds go, 
Though billmen ply the ghastly blow, 

Unbroken was the ring ; 
The stubborn spearmen still made good 
Their dark impenetrable wood, 
Each stepping where his comrade stood 

The instant that he fell. 
No thought was there of dastard flight ; 
Linked in the serried phalanx tight, 
Groom fought like noble, squire like knight, 

As fearlessly and well, 



356 SELECTIONS. 

Till utter darkness closed her wing 
O'er their thin host and wounded king. 
Then skilful Surrey's sage commands 
Led back from strife his shattered bands ; 

And from the charge they drew, 
As mountain-waves from wasted lands 

Sweep back to ocean blue. 
Then did their loss his foemen know; 
Their king, their lords, their mightiest low, 
They melted from the field as snow, 
When streams are swoln and south winds blow, 

Dissolves in silent dew. 
Tweed's echoes heard the ceaseless plash, 

While many a broken band 
Disordered through her currents dash, 

To gain the Scottish land ; 
To town and tower, to down and dale, 
To tell red Flodden's dismal tale, 
And raise the universal wail. 
Tradition, legend, tune, and song 
Shall many an age that wail prolong ; 
Still from the sire the son shall hear 
Of the stern strife and carnage drear 

Of Flodden's fatal field, 
Where shivered was fair Scotland's spear 

And "broken was her shield ! 

Marmion, Canto 77. 

The following extract from Kmilworth describes Queen 
Elizabeth's arrival at the Castle, on the occasion of her 
famous visit to her favorite Leicester. The pupil, in read- 
ing the passage, should consider the application of the 
remarks upon page 184 and page 185. 

It was the twilight of a summer night (9th July, 1575), the sun 
having for some time set, and all were in anxious expectation of 
the Queen's immediate approach. The multitude had remained 
assembled for many hours, and their numbers were still rather 
on the increase. A profuse distribution of refreshments, together 
with roasted oxen, and barrels of ale set a-broach in different 



scott. 357 

places of the road, had kept the populace in perfect love and 
loyalty towards the Queen and her favourite, which might have 
somewhat abated had fasting been added to watching. They 
passed away the time, therefore, with the usual popular amuse- 
ments of whooping, hallooing, shrieking, and playing rude tricks 
upon each other, forming the chorus of discordant sounds usual 
on such occasions. These prevailed all through the crowded 
roads and fields, and especially beyond the gate of the Chase, 
where the greater number of the common sort were stationed ; 
when, all of a sudden, a single rocket was seen to shoot into the 
atmosphere, and, at the instant, far-heard over flood and field, 
the great bell of the Castle tolled. 

Immediately there was a pause of dead silence, succeeded by a 
deep hum of expectation, the united voice of many thousands, 
none of whom spoke above their breath ; or, to use a singular 
expression, the whisper of an immense multitude. 

"They come now, for certain," said Raleigh. "Tressilian, 
that sound is grand. We hear it from this distance, as mariners, 
after a long voyage, hear, upon their night-watch, the tide rush 
upon some distant and unknown shore." 

His farther meditations were interrupted by a shout of applause 
from the multitude, so tremendously vociferous, that the country 
echoed for miles round. The guards, thickly stationed upon the 
road by which the Queen was to advance, caught up the acclama- 
tion, which ran like wildfire to the Castle, and announced to all 
within, that Queen Elizabeth had entered the Royal Chase of 
Kenilworth. The whole music of the Castle sounded at once, and 
a round of artillery, with a salvo of small arms, was discharged 
from the battlements ; but the noise of drums and trumpets, and 
even of the cannon themselves, was but faintly heard, amidst the 
roaring and reiterated welcomes of the multitude. 

As the noise began to abate, a broad glare of light was seen to 
appear from the gate of the Park, and, broadening and brighten- 
ing as it came nearer, advanced along the open and fair avenue 
that led towards the G-allery-tower ; and which, as we have al- 
ready noticed, was lined on either hand by the retainers of the 
Earl of Leicester. The word was passed along the line, "The 
Queen ! The Queen ! Silence, and stand fast ! " Onward came 



358 SELECTIONS. 

the cavalcade, illuminated by two hundred thick waxen torches, 
in the hands of as many horsemen, which cast a light like that 
of broad day all around the procession, but especially on the 
principal group, of which the Queen herself, arrayed in the most 
splendid manner, and blazing with jewels, formed the central 
figure. She was mounted on a milk-white horse, which she 
reined with peculiar grace and dignity ; and in the whole of her 
stately and noble carriage, you saw the daughter of an hundred 
kings. 

The ladies of the court, who rode beside her Majesty, had 
taken especial care that their own external appearance should 
not be more glorious than their rank and the occasion altogether 
demanded, so that no inferior luminary might appear to ap- 
proach the orbit of royalty. But their personal charms, and the 
magnificence by which, under every prudential restraint, they 
were necessarily distinguished, exhibited them, as the very flower 
of a realm so far famed for splendour and beauty. The mag- 
nificence of the courtiers, free from such restraints as prudence 
imposed on the ladies, was yet more unbounded. 

Leicester, who glittered like a golden image with jewels and 
cloth of gold, rode on her Majesty's right hand, as well in quality 
of her host, as of her Master of the Horse. The black steed which 
he mounted had not a single white hair on his body, and was one 
of the most renowned chargers in Europe, having been purchased 
by the Earl at large expense for this royal occasion. As the 
noble animal chafed at the slow pace of the procession, and, arch- 
ing his stately neck, champed on the silver bits which restrained 
him, the foam flew from his mouth, and specked his well-formed 
limbs as if with spots of snow. The rider well became the high 
place which he held, and the proud steed which he bestrode ; for 
no man in England, or perhaps in Europe, w.as more perfect than 
Dudley in horsemanship, and all other exercises belonging to his 
quality. He was bare-headed, as were all the courtiers in the 
train ; and the red torchlight shone upon his long curled tresses 
of dark hair, and on his noble features, to the beauty of which 
even the severest criticism could only object the lordly fault, as 
it may be termed, of a forehead somewhat too high. On that 
proud evening, those features wore all the grateful solicitude of 
a subject, to shew himself sensible of the high honour which the 



SCOTT. 359 

Queen was conferring on him, and all the pride and satisfaction 
which became so glorious a moment. Yet, though neither eye 
nor feature betrayed aught but feelings which suited the occa- 
sion, some of the Earl's personal attendants remarked, that he 
was unusually pale, and they expressed to each other their fear 
that he was taking more fatigue than consisted with his health. 

Varney followed close behind his master, as the principal 
esquire in waiting, and had charge .of his lordship's black velvet 
bonnet, garnished with a clasp of diamonds, and surmounted by 
a white plume. He kept his eye constantly on his master ; and, 
for reasons with which the reader is not unacquainted, was, 
among Leicester's numerous dependents, the one who was most 
anxious that his lord's strength and resolution should carry him 
successfully through a day so agitating. For, although Varney 
was one of the few — the very few moral monsters, who contrive 
to lull to sleep the remorse of their own bosoms, and are drugged 
into moral insensibility by atheism, as men in extreme agony are 
lulled by opium, yet he knew that in the breast of his patron 
there was already awakened the fire that is never quenched, and 
that his lord felt, amid all the pomp and magnificence we have 
described, the gnawing of the worm that dieth not. Still, how- 
ever, assured as Lord Leicester stood, by Varney's own intelli- 
gence, that his Countess laboured under an indisposition which 
formed an unanswerable apology to the Queen for her not ap- 
pearing at Kenilworth, there was little danger, his wily retainer 
thought, that a man so ambitious would betray himself by giving 
way to any external weakness. , 

The train, male and female, who attended immediately upon 
the Queen's person, were of course of the bravest and the fairest, 
— the highest born nobles, and the wisest counsellors, of that 
distinguished reign, to repeat whose names were but to weary 
the reader. Behind came a long crowd of knights and gentle- 
men, whose rank and birth, however distinguished, were thrown 
into shade, as their persons into the rear of a procession, whose 
front was of such august majesty. 

Thus marshalled, the cavalcade approached the Gallery -tower, 
which formed, as we have often observed, the extreme barrier of 
the Castle. 



360 SELECTIONS. 

Elizabeth received most graciously the homage of the hercu- 
lean porter, and, bending her head to him in requital, passed 
through his guarded tower, from the top of which was poured a 
clamorous blast of warlike music, which was replied to by other 
bands of minstrelsy placed at different points on the Castle walls, 
and by others again stationed in the Chase ; while the tones of 
the one, as they yet vibrated on the echoes, were caught up and 
answered by new harmony from different quarters. 

Amidst these bursts of music, which, as if the work of enchant- 
ment, seemed now close at hand, now softened by distant space, 
now wailing so low and sweet as if that distance were gradually 
prolonged until only the last lingering strains could reach the 
ear, Queen Elizabeth crossed the Gallery-tower, and came upon 
the long bridge, which extended from thence to Mortimer's 
Tower, and which was already as light as day, so many torches 
had been fastened to the pallisades on either side. Most of the 
nobles here alighted, and sent their horses to the neighbouring- 
village of Kenilworth, following the Queen on foot, as did the 
gentlemen who had stood in array to receive her at the Gallery- 
tower. 

Meanwhile, the Queen had no sooner stepped on the bridge 
than a new spectacle was provided ; for as soon as the music 
gave signal that she was so far advanced, a raft, so disposed as 
to resemble a small floating island, illuminated by a great vari- 
ety of torches, and surrounded by floating pageants formed to 
represent sea-horses, on which sat Tritons, Nereids, and other 
fabulous deities of the seas and rivers, made its appearance upon 
the lake, and issuing from behind a small heronry where it had 
been concealed, floated gently towards the farther end of the 
bridge. 

On the islet appeared a beautiful woman, clad in a watchet- 
coloured silken mantle, bound with a broad girdle, inscribed with 
characters like the phylacteries of the Hebrews. Her feet and 
arms were bare, but her wrists and ankles were adorned with 
gold bracelets of uncommon size. Amidst her long silky black 
hair, she wore a crown or chaplet of artificial mistletoe, and bore 
in her hand a rod of ebony tipped with silver. Two Nymphs 
attended on her, dressed in the same antique and mystical guise. 

The pageant was so well managed, that this Lady of the Float- 



SCOTT. 361 

ing Island, having performed her voyage with much picturesque 
effect, landed at Mortimer's Tower with her two attendants, just 
as Elizabeth presented herself before that outwork. The stranger 
then, in a well-penned speech, announced herself as that famous 
Lady of the Lake, renowned in the stories of King Arthur, who 
had nursed the youth of the redoubted Sir Lancelot, and whose 
beauty had proved too powerful both for the wisdom and the 
spells of the mighty Merlin. Since that early period she had re- 
mained possessed of her crystal dominions, she said, despite the 
various men of fame and might by whom Kenilworth had been 
successively tenanted. The Saxons, the Danes, the Normans, 
the Saintlowes, the Clintons, the Mountforts, the Mortimers, the 
Plantagenets, great though they were in arms and magnificence, 
had never, she said, caused her to raise her head from the waters 
which hid her crystal palace. But a greater than all these great 
names had now appeared, and she came in homage and duty to 
welcome the peerless Elizabeth to all sport, which the Castle and 
its environs, which lake or land, could afford. 

The Queen received this address also with great courtesy, and 
made answer in raillery, ' ' We thought this lake had belonged to 
our own dominions, fair dame ; but since so famed a lady claims 
it for hers, we will be glad at some other time to have farther 
communing with you touching our joint interests." 

With this gracious answer the Lady of the Lake vanished, and 
Arion, who was amongst the maritime deities, appeared upon his 
dolphin. But Lambourne, who had taken upon him the part in 
the absence of Wayland, being chilled with remaining immersed 
in an element to which he was not friendly, having never got his 
speech by heart, and not having, like the porter, the advantage 
of a prompter, paid it off with impudence, tearing off his vizard, 
and swearing, " Cogs bones ! he was none of Arion or Orion 
either, but honest Mike Lambourne, that had been drinking 
her Majesty's health from morning till midnight, and was come 
to bid her heartily welcome to Kenilworth Castle." 

This unpremeditated buffoonery answered the purpose proba- 
bly better than the set speech would have done. The Queen 
laughed heartily, and swore (in her turn) that he had made the 
best speech she had heard that day. Lambourne, who instantly 
saw his jest had saved his bones, jumped on shore, gave his dol- 



362 SELECTIONS. 

phin a kick, and declared he would never meddle with fish again, 
except at dinner. 

At the same time that the Queen was about to enter the Castle, 
that memorable discharge of fireworks by water and land took 
place, which Master Laneham, formerly introduced to the reader, 
has strained all his eloquence to describe. 

"Such," says the Clerk of the Council-chamber door, "was 
the blaze of burning darts, the gleams of stars coruscant, the 
streams and hail of fiery sparks, lightnings of wildfire, and flight- 
shot of thunder-bolts, with continuance, terror, and vehemency, 
that the heavens thundered, the waters surged, and the earth 
shook ; and, for my part, hardy as I am, it made me very venge- 
ably afraid." 

BYRON. 

Byron's relation to Nature has been mentioned on 
page 193. The following stanzas show distinctly the spirit 
of the man: his joy in communing with mountains and 
ocean, and again his morbid fondness for calling himself 
"a thing restless and worn." 

Where rose the mountains, there to him were friends ; 
Where roll'd the ocean, thereon was his home; 
Where a blue sky, and glowing clime, extends, 
He had the passion and the power to roam ; 
The desert, forest, cavern, breaker's foam, 
Were unto him companionship ; they spake 
A mutual language, clearer than the tome 
Of his land's tongue, which he would oft forsake 
For Nature's pages glass'd by sunbeams on the lake. 

Like the Chaldean, he could watch the stars, 
Till he had peopled them with beings bright 
As their own beams ; and earth, and earth-born jars, 
And human frailties, were forgotten quite : 
Could he have kept his spirit to that flight 
He had been happy; but this clay will sink 
Its spark immortal, envying it the light 
To which it mounts, as if to break the link 
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brink. 



BYRON. 363 

But in Man's dwellings he became a thing 
Restless and worn, and stern and wearisome, 
Droop'd as a wild-born falcon with clipp'd wing, 
To whom the boundless air alone were home: 
Then came his fit again, which to o'ercome, 
As eagerly the barr'd-up bird will beat 
His breast and beak against his wiry dome 
Till the blood tinge his plumage, so the heat 
Of his impeded soul would through his bosom eat. 

ChUde Harold, Canto III. 

To the student and the traveler, Byron's descriptions of 
places famous in history afford more pleasure than any 
other part of his works. The imaginative reader will find 
much to enjoy in the following picturesque and suggestive 
description of the Coliseum at Eome: 

And here the buzz of eager nations ran, 
In murmur'd pity, or loud-roar'd applause, 
As man was slaughter'd by his fellow man. 
And wherefore si aughter'd? wherefore, but because 
Such were the bloody Circus' genial laws, 
And the imperial pleasure. — Wherefore not? 
What matters where we fall to fill the maws 
Of worms — on battle-plains or listed spot? 
Both are but theatres where the chief actors rot. 

I see before me the Gladiator lie : 
He leans upon his hand — his manly brow 
Consents to death, but conquers agony, 
And his droop'd head sinks gradually low — 
And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow 
From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one, 
Like the first of a thunder-shower ; and now 
The arena swims around him — he is gone, 
Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hail'd the wretch who won. 

He heard it, but he heeded not — his eyes 
Were with his heart, and that was far away; 
He reck'd not of the life he lost nor prize, 
But where his rude hut by the Danube lay, 



364 SELECTIONS. 

There were his young barbarians all at play, 
There was their Dacian mother — he, their sire, 
Butcher'd to make a Roman holiday — 
All this rush'd with his blood— Shall he expire 
And unavenged?— Arise! ye Goths, and glut your irel 

But here, where Murder breathed her bloody steam ; 
And here, where buzzing nations choked the ways, 
And roar'd or murmur'd like a mountain stream 
Dashing or winding as its torrent strays ; 
Here, where the Roman millions' blame or praise 
Was death or life, the playthings of a crowd, 
My voice sounds much — and fall the stars' faint rays 
On the arena void — seats crush'd — walls bow'd — 
And galleries, where my steps seem echoes strangely loud. 

A ruin — yet what ruin! from its mass 
Walls, palaces, half-cities, have been rear'd; 
Yet oft the enormous skeleton ye pass, 
And marvel where the spoil could have appear'd. 
Hath it indeed been plunder'd, or but clear'd? 
Alas! develop'd, opens the decay, 
When the colossal fabric's form is near'd : 
It will not bear the brightness of the day, 
Which streams too much on all years, man, have reft away. 

But when the rising moon begins to climb 
Its topmost arch, and gently pauses there ; 
When the stars twinkle through the loops of time, 
And the low night-breeze waves along the air 
The garland-forest, which the gray walls wear, 
Like laurels on the bald first Caesar's head ; 
When the light shines serene but doth not glare, 
Then in this magic circle raise the dead : 
Heroes have trod this spot — 'tis on their dust ye tread. 

"While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand; 
When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ; 
And when Rome falls— the World." From our own land 
Thus spake the pilgrims o'er this mighty wall 






BYRON. 365 

In Saxon times, which we are wont to call 
Ancient ; and these three mortal things are still 
On their foundations, and unalter'd all ; 
Rome and her Ruin past Redemption's skill, 
The World, the same wide den — of thieves, or what ye will. 

Childe Harold, Canto IV. 

Mazeppa is a piece of narrative verse, illustrating the 
ease, energy, and picturesqueness of Byron's best style. 
The young hero, Mazeppa, for certain misconduct, meets 
a terrible punishment. He is bound naked upon the back 
of a wild horse and sent riding away to his death. After 
the terrible ride described in the following stanzas, he was 
found senseless by the Cossacks, who brought him back to 
life, and years after made him their prince and leader. 

"Bring forth the horse! " — the horse was brought ; 

In truth, he was a noble steed, 

A Tartar of the Ukraine breed, 
Who look'd as though the speed of thought 
Were in his limbs ; but he was wild, 

Wild as the wild deer, and untaught, 
With spur and bridle undefiled — 

'Twas but a day he had been caught; 
And snorting, with erected mane, 
And struggling fiercely, but in vain, 
In the full foam of wrath and dread 
To me the desert-born was led : 
They bound me on, that menial throng, 
Upon his back with many a thong; 
They loosed him with a sudden lash — 
Away! — away! — and on we dash! — 
Torrents less rapid and less rash. 

Away ! — away ! — My breath was gone — 
I saw not where he hurried on : 
'Twas scarcely yet the break of day, 
And on he foam'd — away! — away! — 
The last of human sounds which rose, 
As I was darted from my foes, 



366 SELECTIONS. 

Was the wild shout of savage laughter, 
Which on the wind came roaring after 
A moment from that rabble rout : 
With sudden wrath I wrench'd my head, 
And snapp'd the cord, which to the mane 
Had bound my neck, in lieu of rein, 
And writhing half my form about, 
Howl'd back my curse ; but 'midst the tread, 
The thunder of my courser's speed, 
Perchance they did not hear nor heed : 
It vexes me — for I would fain 
Have paid their insult back again. 
I paid it well in after days : 
There is not of that castle gate, 
Its drawbridge and portcullis' weight, 
Stone, bar, moat, bridge, or barrier left; 
Nor of its fields a blade of grass, 
Save what grows on a ridge of wall, 
Where stood the hearth-stone of the hall. 

Away, away, my steed and I, 
Upon the pinions of the wind, 
All human dwellings left behind ; 
We sped like meteors through the sky, 
When with its crackling sound the night 
Is checker'd with the northern light : 
Town — village — none were on our track, 

But a wild plain of far extent, 
And bounded by a forest black ; 

And, save the scarce seen battlement 
On distant heights of some strong hold, 
Against the Tartars built of old, 
No trace of man. The year before 
A Turkish army had march'd o'er; 
And where the Spahi's hoof hath trod, 
The verdure flies the bloody sod: — 
The sky was dull, and dim, and gray, 
And a low breeze crept moaning by— 
I could have answer'd with a sigh — 
But fast we fled, away, away — 
And I could neither sigh nor pray ; 



BYRON. 367 

And my cold sweat-drops fell like rain 
Upon the courser's bristling mane ; 
But, snorting still with rage and fear, 
He flew upon his far career ; 
At times I almost thought, indeed, 
He must have slacken'd in his speed ; 
But no — my bound and slender frame 

Was nothing to his angry might, 
And merely like a spur became : 
Each motion which I made to free 
My swoln limbs from their agony 

Increased his fury and affright : 
I tried my voice, — 'twas faint and low, 
But yet he swerved as from a blow ; 
And, starting to each accent, sprang 
As from a sudden trumpet's clang : 
Meantime my cords were wet with gore, 
Which, oozing through my limbs, ran o'er; 
And in my tongue the thirst became 
A something fierier far than flame. 

We near'd the wild wood— 'twas so wide, 
I saw no bounds on either side. 
The boughs gave way, and did not tear 
My limbs ; and I found strength to bear 
My wounds, already scarr'd with cold — 
My bonds forbade to loose my hold. 
We rustled through the leaves like wind, 
Left shrubs, and trees, and wolves behind ; 
By night I heard them on the track, 
Their troop came hard upon our back, 
With their long gallop, which can tire 
The hound's deep hate, and hunter's fire: 
Where'er we flew they follow'd on, 
Nor left us with the morning sun ; 
Behind I saw them, scarce a rood, 
At daybreak winding through the wood, 
And through the night had heard their feet 
Their stealing, rustling step repeat. 
Oh ! how I wish'd for spear or sword, 
At least to die amidst the horde, 



368 SELECTIONS. 

And perish — if it must be so — 
At bay, destroying many a foe. 
When first my courser's race begun, 
I wish'd the goal already won ; 
But now I doubted strength and speed. 
Vain doubt ! his swift and savage breed 
Had nerved him like the mountain-roe; 
Nor faster falls the blinding snow 
Which whelms the peasant near the door 
Whose threshold he shall cross no more, 
Bewilder'd with the dazzling blast, 
Than through the forest-paths he pass'd — 
Untired, untamed, and worse than wild ; 
All furious as a favor'd child 
Balk'd of its wish ; or fiercer still — 
A woman piqued — who has her will. 

The wood was pass'd; 'twas more than noon, 

But chill the air, although in June ; 

Or it might be my veins ran cold — 

Prolong'd endurance tames the bold; 

And I was then not what I seem, 

But headlong as a wintry stream, 

And wore my feelings out before 

I well could count their causes o'er: 

And what with fury, fear, and wrath, 

The tortures which beset my path, 

Cold, hunger, sorrow, shame, distress, 

Thus bound in nature's nakedness ; 

Sprung from a race whose rising blood 

When stirr'd beyond its calmer mood, 

And trodden hard upon, is like 

The rattlesnake's, in act to strike, 

What marvel if this worn-out trunk 

Beneath its woes a moment sunk ? 

The earth gave way, the skies roll'd round, 

I seem'd to sink upon the ground ; 

But err'd, for I was fastly bound. 

My heart turn'd sick, my brain grew sore, 

And throbb'd awhile, then beat no more : 



BYRON. 369 

The skies spun like a mighty wheel; 
I saw the trees like drunkards reel, 
And a slight flash sprang o'er my eyes, 
Which saw no farther : he who dies 
Can die no more than then I died. 
O'ertortured by that ghastly ride, 
I felt the blackness come and go, 

And strove to wake ; but could not make 
My senses climb up from below : 
I felt as on a plank at sea, 
When all the waves that dash o'er thee, 
At the same time upheave and whelm, 
And hurl thee towards a desert realm : 
My undulating life was as 
The fancied lights that flitting pass 
Our shut eyes in deep midnight, when 
Fever begins upon the brain ; 
But soon it pass'd, with little pain, 

But a confusion worse than such: 

I own that I should deem it much, 
Dying, to feel the same again ; 
And yet I do suppose we must 
Feel far more ere we turn to dust : 
No matter ; I have bared my brow 
Full in Death's face — before — and now. 

My thoughts came back ; where was I ? Cold, 

And numb, and giddy: pulse by pulse 

Life reassumed its lingering hold, 

And throb by throb : till grown a pang 
Which for a moment would convulse, 
My blood reflow'd, though thick and chill; 

My ear with uncouth noises rang, 
My heart began once more to thrill ; 

My sight return'd, though dim ; alas ! 

And thicken'd, as it were, with glass. 

Methought the dash of waves was nigh ; 

There was a gleam too of the sky, 

Studded with stars ; — it is no dream ; 

The wild horse swims the wilder stream ! 



370 SELECTIONS. 

The bright broad river's gushing tide 
Sweeps, winding onward, far and wide, 
And we are half-way, struggling o'er 
To yon unknown and silent shore. 
The waters broke my hollow trance, 
And with a temporary strength 

My stiffen'd limbs were rebaptized. 
My courser's broad breast proudly braves, 
And dashes off the ascending waves, 
And onward we advance ! 
We reach the slippery shore at length, 

A haven I but little prized, 
For all behind was dark and drear, 
And all before was night and fear. 
How many hours of night or day 
In those suspended pangs I lay, 
I could not tell ; I scarcely knew 
If this were human breath I drew. 



With glossy skin and dripping mane, 
And reeling limbs, and reeking flank, 

The wild steed's sinewy nerves still strain 
Up the repelling bank. 

We gain the top : a boundless plain 

Spreads through the shadow of the night, 
And onward, onward, onward, seems, 
Like precipices in our dreams, 

To stretch beyond the sight ; 

And here and there a speck of white, 
Or scatter'd spot of dusky green, 

In masses broke into the light, 

As rose the moon upon my right. 

Onward we went — but slack and slow ; 

His savage force at length o'erspent, 
The drooping courser, faint and low, 

All feebly foaming went. 
A sickly infant had had power 
To guide him forward in that hour; 



BYEON. 371 

But useless all to me. 
His new-born tameness naught avail'd — 
My limbs were bound ; my force had f ail'd, 

Perchance, had they been free. 
With feeble effort still I tried 
To rend the bonds so starkly tied — 

But still it was in vain ; 
My limbs were only wrung the more, 
And soon the idle strife gave o'er, 

Which but prolong'd their pain : 
The dizzy race seem'd almost done, 
Although no goal was nearly won : 
Some streaks announced the coming sun — 

How slow, alas ! he came ! 
Methought that mist of dawning gray 
Would never dapple into day; 
How heavily it roll'd away — 

Before the eastern flame 
Rose crimson, and deposed the stars, 
And call'd the radiance from their cars, 
And fill'd the earth, from his deep throne, 
With lonely lustre, all his own. 

Up rose the sun ; the mists were curl'd 
Back from the solitary world 
Which lay around — behind — before ; 
What booted it to traverse o'er 

Plain, forest, river ? Man nor brute, 

Nor dint of hoof, nor print of foot, 
Lay in the wild luxuriant soil ; 
No sign of travel — none of toil ; 

The very air was mute ; 
And not an insect's shrill small horn, 
Nor matin bird's new voice was borne 
From herb nor thicket. Many a werst, 
Panting as if his heart would burst, 
The weary brute still stagger'd on ; 
And still we were — or seem'd — alone : 
At length, while reeling on our way, 
Methought I heard a courser neigh, 



372 SELECTIONS. 

From out yon tuft of blackening firs. 
Is it the wind those branches stirs ? 
No, no ! from out the forest prance 

A trampling troop ; x see them come ! 
In one vast squadron they advance ! 

I strove to cry — my lips were dumb. 
The steeds rush on in plunging pride ; 
But where are they the reins to guide ? 
A thousand horse — and none to ride ! 
With flowing tail, and flying mane, 
Wide nostrils — never stretch'd by pain, 
Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein, 
And feet that iron never shod, 
And flanks unscarr'd by spur or rod, 
A thousand horse, the wild, the free, 
Like waves that follow o'er the sea, 

Came thickly thundering on, 
As if our faint approach to meet ; 
The sight renerved my courser's feet, 
A moment staggering, feebly fleet, 
A moment, with a faint low neigh, 

He answer'd, and then fell ; 
With gasps and glazing eyes he lay, 

And reeking limbs immovable, 
His first and last career is done ! 
On came the troop — they saw him stoop, 

They saw me strangely bound along 

His back with many a bloody thong : 
They stop — they start — they snuff the air, 
Gallop a moment here and there, 
Approach, retire, wheel round and round, 
Then plunging back with sudden bound, 
Headed by one black mighty steed, 
Who seem'd the patriarch of his breed, 

Without a single speck or hair 
Of white upon his shaggy hide ; 
They snort — they foam — neigh — swerve aside, 
And backward to the forest fly, 
By instinct, from a human eye. — 

They left me there to my despair, 



BYKOH. 373 



Link'd to the dead and stiffening wretch, 
Whose lifeless limbs beneath me stretch, 
Relieved from that unwonted weight, 
From whence I could not extricate 
Nor him nor me — and there we lay 

The dying on the dead ! 
I little deem'd another day 

Would see my houseless, helpless head. 



And there from morn till twilight bound 
I felt the heavy hours toil round, 
With just enough of light to- see 
My last of suns go down on me. 



The sun was sinking — still I lay 

Chain'd to the chill and stiffening steed, 
I thought to mingle there our clay ; 

And my dim eyes of death hath need, 

No hope arose of being freed : 
I cast my last looks up the sky, 

And there between me and the sun 
I saw the expecting raven fly, 
Who scarce would wait till both should die, 

Ere his repast begun ; 
He flew, and perch'd, then flew once more, 
And each time nearer than before ; 
I saw his wing through twilight flit, 
And once so near me he alit 

I could have smote, but lack'd the strength 
But the slight motion of my hand, 
And feeble scratching of the sand, 
The exerted throat's faint struggling noise, 
Which scarcely could be call'd a voice, 

Together scared him off at length. — 
I know no more — my latest dream 

Is something of a lovely star 

Which fix'd my dull eyes from afar, 
And went and came with wandering beam, 



3*74 SELECTIONS. 

And of the cold, dull, swimming, dense 
Sensation of recurring sense, 

And then subsiding back to death, 

And then again a little breath, 
A little thrill, a short suspense, 

An icy sickness curdling o'er 
My heart, and sparks that cross'd my brain- 
A gasp, a throb, a start of pain, 

A sigh, and nothing more. 



WORDSWORTH. 

Mention has been made of Wordsworth's famous poem, 

On Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early 

Childhood, and an extract from the ode was given on page 

203. The closing stanzas are quoted here. They carry 

on the beautiful but unsubstantial thought of the poem, 

that 

"Heaven lies about us in our infancy!" 

joy ! that in our embers 

Is something that doth live, 

That nature yet remembers 

What was so fugitive ! 
The thought of our past years in me doth breed 
Perpetual benediction : not indeed 
For that which is most worthy to be blest; 
Delight and liberty, the simple creed 
Of childhood, whether busy or at rest, 
With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast : — 
Not for these I raise 
The song of thanks and praise ; 

But for those obstinate questionings 

Of sense and outward things, 

Fallings from us, vanishings ; 

Blank misgivings of a Creature 
Moving about in worlds not realised, 
High instincts before which our mortal Nature 
Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised : 



WORDSWORTH. 375 

But for those first affections, 

Those shadowy recollections, 
Which, be they what they may, 
Are yet the fountain light of all our day, 
Are yet a master light of all our seeing ; 

Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make 
Our noisy years seem moments in the being 
Of the eternal Silence : truths that wake, 

To perish never ; 
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour, 

Nor Man nor Boy, 
Nor all that is at enmity with joy, 
Can utterly abolish or destroy! 

Hence, in a season of calm weather, 
Though inland far we be, 
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea 
Which brought us hither, 

Can in a moment travel thither, 
And see the children sport upon the shore, 
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore. 

Then sing ye Birds, sing, sing a joyous song! 
And let the young Lambs bound 
As to the tabor's sound ! 
We in thought will join your throng, 
Ye that pipe and ye that play, 
Ye that through your hearts to-day 
Feel the gladness of the May I 
What though the radiance which was once so bright 
Be now for ever taken from my sight, 

Though nothing can bring back the hour 
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower; 
We will grieve not, rather find 
Strength in what remains behind ; 
In the primal sympathy 
Which having been must ever be, 
In the soothing thoughts that spring 
Out of human suffering, 
In the faith that looks through death, 
In years that bring the philosophic mind. 



376 SELECTIONS. 

And 0, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves, 

Think not of any severing of our loves ! 

Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might ; 

I only have relinquished one delight 

To live beneath your more habitual sway. 

I love the Brooks which down their channels fret, 

Even more than when I tripped lightly as they; 

The innocent brightness of a new-born Day 

Is lovely yet ; 
The Clouds that gather round the setting sun 
Do take a sober colouring from an eye 
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality; 
Another race hath been, and other palms are won. 
Thanks to the human heart by which we live, 
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears, 
To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears. 

The following selections from Wordsworth's long poems, 
The Excursion and The Prelude, will reveal the source 
of his own best inspiration, and will also show the peculiar 
inspiration that he communicates to his readers. It is fair 
to say that such chosen passages do not convey a just im- 
pression of these two poems as a whole. The Excursion 
and The Prelude contain sublime poetry, but they also 
contain pages that are weary and unprofitable reading. 
The lover of Wordsworth must frankly accept the inequali- 
ties of his poetry. 

Such was the Boy, — but for the growing Youth 
What soul was his, when, from the naked top 
Of some bold headland, he beheld the sun 
Rise up, and bathe the world in light ! He looked : 
Ocean and earth, the solid frame of earth 
And ocean's liquid mass, in gladness lay 
Beneath him ; far and vide the clouds were touched, 
And in their silent faces could he read 
Unutterable love. Sound needed none, 
Nor any voice of joy ; his spirit drank 



WORDSWORTH. 377 

The spectacle : sensation, soul, and form, 
All melted into him; they swallowed up 
His animal being ; in them did he live, 
And by them did he live ; they were his life. 
In such access of mind, in such high hour 
Of visitation from the living God, 
Thought was not ; in enjoyment it expired. 
No thanks he breathed, he proffered no request ; 
Rapt into still communion that transcends 
The imperfect offices of prayer and praise, 
His mind was a thanksgiving to the Power 
That made him; it was blessedness and love! 

A Herdsman on the lonely mountain-tops, 
Such intercourse was his, and in this sort 
Was his existence oftentimes possessed. 
then how beautiful, how bright, appeared 
The written promise ! Early had he learned 
To reverence the volume that displays 
The mystery, the life which cannot die; 
But in the mountains did he feel his faith. 
All things, responsive to the writing, there 
Breathed immortality, revolving life, 
And greatness still revolving ; infinite : 
There littleness was not ; the least of things 
Seemed infinite ; and there his spirit shaped 
Her prospects, nor did he believe, — he saw. 
What wonder if his being thus became 
Sublime and comprehensive ! Low desires, 
Low thoughts, had there no place ; yet was his heart 
Lowly; for he was meek in gratitude, 
Oft as he called those ecstasies to mind, 
And whence they flowed ; and from them he acquired 
Wisdom, which works through patience ; thence he learned 
In oft-recurring hours of sober thought 
To look on Nature with a humble heart, 
Self -questioned where it did not understand, 
And with a superstitious eye of love. 

And thus before his eighteenth year was told, 
Accumulated feelings pressed his heart 



378 SELECTIONS. 

With still increasing weight ; he was o'erpowered 

By Nature ; by the turbulence subdued 

Of his own mind; by mystery and hope, 

And the first virgin passion of a soul 

Communing with the glorious universe. 

Full often wished he that the winds might rage 

When they were silent : far more fondly now 

Than in his earlier season did he love 

Tempestuous nights, — the conflict and the sounds 

That live in darkness. From his intellect 

And from the stillness of abstracted thought 

He asked repose ; and, failing oft to win 

The peace required, he scanned the laws of light 

Amid the roar of torrents, where they send 

From hollow clefts up to the clearer air 

A cloud of mist, that, smitten by the sun, 

Varies its rainbow hues. But vainly thus, 

And vainly by ail other means, he strove 

To mitigate the fever of his heart. 

In dreams, in study, and in ardent thought, 
Thus was he reared ; much wanting to assist 
The growth of intellect, yet gaining more, 
And every moral feeling of his soul 
Strengthened and braced, by breathing in content 
The keen, the wholesome air of poverty, 
And drinking from the well of homely life. 

The Excursion, Booh J. 

But ere nightfall, 
When in our pinnace we returned at leisure 
Over the shadowy lake, and to the beach 
Of some small island steered our course with one, 
The Minstrel of the Troop, and left him there, 
And rowed off gently, while he blew his flute 
Alone upon the rock, — then the calm 
And dead still water lay upon my mind 
Even with a weight of pleasure, and the sky, 
Never before so beautiful, sank down 
Into my heart, and held me like a dream ! 
Thus were my sympathies enlarged, and thus 



WORDSWORTH. 379 

Daily the common range of visible things 
Grew dear to me : already I began 
To love the sun ; a boy I loved the sun, 
Not as I since have loved him, as a pledge 
And surety of our earthly life, a light 
Which we behold and feel we are alive, 
Nor for his bounty to so many worlds, — ■ 
But for this cause, that I had seen him lay 
His beauty on the morning hills, had seen 
The western mountain touch his setting orb, 
In many a thoughtless hour, when, from excess 
Of happiness, my blood appeared to flow 
For its own pleasure, and I breathed with joy. 
And, from like feelings, humble though intense, 
To patriotic and domestic love 
Analogous, the moon to me was dear ; 
For I could dream away my purposes, 
Standing to gaze upon her while she hung 
Midway between the hills, as if she knew 
No other region, but belonged to thee. 
Yea, appertained by a peculiar right 
To thee and thy gray huts, thou one dear Vale ! 

For I would walk alone, 
Under the quiet stars, and at that time 
Have felt whate'er there is of power in sound 
To breathe an elevated mood, by form 
Or image unprofaned ; and I would stand, 
If the night blackened with a coming storm, 
Beneath some rock, listening to notes that are 
The ghostly language of the ancient earth, 
Or make their dim abode in distant winds. 
Thence did I drink the visionary power; 
And deem not profitless those fleeting moods 
Of shadowy exultation : not for this, 
That they are kindred to our purer mind 
And intellectual life ; but that the soul, 
Remembering how she felt, but what she felt 
Remembering not, retains an obscure sense 
Of possible sublimity, whereto 
With growing faculties she doth aspire, 



380 SELECTIONS. 

With faculties still growing, feeling still 
That, whatsoever point they gain, they yet 
Have something to pursue. 

The Prelude, Book I. 

We add some fragmentary verses which are characteristic 
and memorable. 

Oft did he take delight 
To measure the altitude of some tall crag 
That is the eagle's birthplace, or some peak 
Familiar with forgotten years, that shows 
Inscribed upon its visionary sides 
The history of many a winter storm, 
Or obscure records of the path of fire. 

The Excursion, Book I. 

We live by Admiration, Hope, and Love ; 
And, even as these are well and wisely fixed, 
In dignity of being we ascend. 

The Excursion, Book IV. 

If, in this time 
Of dereliction and dismay, I yet 
Despair not of our nature, but retain 
A more than Roman confidence, a faith 
That fails not, in all sorrow my support, 
The blessing of my life, — the gift is yours, 
Ye winds and sounding cataracts ! 't is yours, 
Ye mountains ! thine, Nature ! Thou hast fed 
My lofty speculations ; and in thee, 
For this uneasy heart of ours. I find 
A never-failing principle of joy 
And purest passion. 

The Prelude, Book II. 

She lived unknown, and few could know 

When Lucy ceased to be ; 
But she is in her grave, and, oh, 

The difference to me ! 

"She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways.'''' 



WORDSWORTH. 381 

" ^he Stars of midnight shall be dear 
To her ; and she shall lean her ear 
In many a secret place 

Where Rivulets dance their wayward round, 
And beauty born of murmuring sound 
Shall pass into her face." 

" Three Years She Grew" 

The Child is Father of the Man; 
And I could wish my days to be 
Bound each to each by natural piety. 

"My Heart Leaps Up." 

The moving accident is not my trade: 
To freeze the blood I have no ready arts: 
'Tis my delight, alone in summer shade, 
To pipe a simple song for thinking hearts. 

Hart-Leap Well, Part. Second. 

And what, for this frail world, were all 

That mortals do or suffer, 
Did no responsive harp, no pen, 

Memorial tribute offer? 
Yea, what were mighty Nature's self? 

Her features, could they win us, 
Unhelped by the poetic voice 

That hourly speaks within us? 

Yarrow Revisited. 

Blessings be with them — and eternal praise, 
Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler cares — 
The Poets, who on earth have made us heirs 
Of truth and pure delight by heavenly lays! 
Oh ! might my name be numbered among theirs, 
Then gladly would I end my mortal days. 

Sonnet on Personal Talk. 



382 SELECTIONS, 



MACAULAY. 

The following selection from Macaulay shows his strong, 
clear, and brilliant style. His view of Boswell is the old 
view; but just readers have come to see the impossibility 
of Macaulay 's glittering paradox, u If he had not been a 
great fool, he would never have been a great writer." 

The Life of Johnson is assuredly a great, a very great work. 
Homer is not more decidedly the first of heroic poets, Shake- 
speare is not more decidedly the first of dramatists, Demosthenes 
is not more decidedly the first of orators, than Boswell is the 
first of biographers. He has no second. He has distanced all 
his competitors so decidedly that it is not worth while to place 
them. Eclipse is first, and the rest nowhere. 

"We are not sure that there is in the whole history of the human 
intellect so strange a phenomenon as this book. Many of the 
greatest men that ever lived have written biography. Boswell 
was one of the smallest men that ever lived, and he has beaten 
them all. He was, if we are to give any credit to his own ac- 
count or to the united testimony of all who knew him, a man of 
the meanest and feeblest intellect. Johnson described him as a 
fellow who had missed his only chance of immortality by not 
having been alive when the Dunciad was written. Beauclerk 
used his name as a proverbial expression for a bore. He was 
the laughing-stock of the whole of that brilliant society which 
has owed to him the greater part of its fame. He was always 
laying himself at the feet of some eminent man, and begging 
to be spit upon and trampled upon. He was always earning 
some ridiculous nickname, and then ' ' binding it as a crown 
unto him," not merely in metaphor, but literally. 

That such a man should have written one of the best books in 
the world is strange enough. But this is not all. Many persons 
who have conducted themselves foolishly in active life, and 
whose conversation has indicated no superior powers of mind, 
have left us valuable works. Goldsmith was very justly de- 



MACAULAY. 383 

scribed by one of his contemporaries as an inspired idiot, and by 
another as a being 

" Who wrote like an angel, and talked like poor Poll." 

La Fontaine was in society a mere simpleton. His blunders 
would not come in amiss among the stories of Hierocles. But 
these men attained literary eminence in spite of their weak- 
nesses. Boswell attained it by reason of his weaknesses. If 
he had not been a great fool, he would never have been a great 
writer. Without all the qualities which made him the jest and 
the torment of those among whom he lived, without theofficious- 
ness, the inquisitiveness, the effrontery, the toad-eating, the in- 
sensibility to all reproof, he never could have produced so excel- 
lent a book. 

Those parts of his book which, considered abstractedly, are 
most utterly worthless, are delightful when we read them as 
illustrations of the character of the writer. Bad in themselves, 
they are good dramatically, like the nonsense of Justice Shallow, 
the clipped English of Dr. Caius, or the misplaced consonants of 
Fluellen. Of all confessors, Boswell is the most candid. Other 
men who have pretended to lay open their own hearts, Kousseau, 
for example, and Lord Byron, have evidently written with a 
constant view to effect, and are to be then most distrusted when 
they seem to be most sincere. There is scarcely any man who 
would not rather accuse himself of great crimes and of dark and 
tempestuous passions than proclaim all his little vanities and 
wild fancies. It would be easier to find a person who would 
avow actions like those of Caesar Borgia or Danton, than one 
who would publish a daydream like those of Alnaschar and Mal- 
volio. Those weaknesses which most men keep covered up in 
the most secret places of the mind, not to be disclosed to the eye 
of friendship or of love, were precisely the weaknesses which 
Boswell paraded before all the world. He was perfectly frank, 
because the weakness of his understanding and the tumult of his 
spirits prevented him from knowing when he made himself ridic- 
ulous. His book resembles nothing so much as the conversation 
of the inmates of the Palace of Truth. 

His fame is great; and it will, we have no doubt, be lasting; 



384 SELECTIONS. 

but it is fame of a peculiar kind, and indeed marvellously resem- 
bles infamy. We remember no other case in which the world 
has made so great a distinction between a book and its author. 
In general, the book and the author are considered as one. To 
admire the book is to admire the author. The case of Boswell is 
an exception, we think the only exception, to this rule. His 
work is universally allowed to be interesting, instructive, emi- 
nently original; yet it has brought him nothing but contempt. 
All the world reads it; all the world delights in it: yet we do 
not remember ever to have read or ever to have heard any ex- 
pression of respect and admiration for the man to whom we owe 
so much instruction and amusement. 

Essay on Crofter's edition of BoswelVs Life of Johnson. 

The following selection is from Macaulay's Essay on 
Byron: 

It was in description and meditation that Byron excelled. 
"Description," as he said in Don Juan, "was his forte." His 
manner is indeed peculiar, and is almost unequalled; rapid, 
sketchy, full of vigour; the selection happy; the strokes few and 
bold. In spite of the reverence which we feel for the genius of 
Mr. Wordsworth, we cannot but think that the minuteness of his 
descriptions often diminishes their effect. He has accustomed 
himself to gaze on nature with the eye of a lover, to dwell on 
every feature, and to mark every change of aspect. Those beau- 
ties which strike the most negligent observer, and those which 
only a close attention discovers, are equally familiar to him and 
are equally prominent in his poetry. The proverb of old Hesiod, 
that half is often more than the whole, is eminently applicable to 
description. The policy of the Dutch who cut down most of the 
precious trees in the Spice Islands, in order to raise the value of 
what remained, was a policy which poets would do well to imi- 
tate. It was a policy which no poet understood better than 
Lord Byron. Whatever his faults might be, he was never, while 
his mind retained its vigour, accused of prolixity. 

His descriptions, great as was their intrinsic merit, derived 
their principal interest from the feeling which always mingled 
with them. He was himself the beginning, the middle, and the 



MACAULAY. 385 

end, of all his own poetry, the hero of every tale, the chief ob- 
ject in every landscape. Harold, Lara, Manfred, and a crowd of 
other characters, were universally considered merely as loose 
incognitos of Byron; and there is every reason to believe that he 
meant them to be so considered. The wonders of the outer 
world, the Tagus, with the mighty fleets of England riding on its 
bosom, the towers of Cintra overhanging the shaggy forest of 
cork-trees and willows, the glaring marble of Pentelicus, the 
banks of the Rhine, the glaciers of Clarens, the sweet Lake of 
Leman, the dell of Egeria with its summer-birds and rustling 
lizards, the shapeless ruins of Rome overgrown with ivy and 
wall-flowers, the stars, the sea, the mountains, all were mere ac- 
cessories, the background to one dark and melancholy figure. 

Never had any writer so vast a command of the whole elo- 
quence of scorn, misanthropy and despair. That Marah was 
never dry. No art could sweeten, no draughts could exhaust, its 
perennial waters of bitterness. Never was there such variety in 
monotony as that of Byron. From maniac laughter to piercing 
lamentation, there was not a single note of human anguish of 
which he was not master. Year after year, and month after 
month, he continued to repeat that to be wretched is the destiny 
of all; that to be eminently wretched is the destiny of the 
eminent; that all the desires by which we are cursed lead alike 
to misery : if they are not gratified, to the misery of disappoint- 
ment; if they are gratified, to the misery of satiety. His 
heroes are men who have arrived by different roads at the same 
goal of despair, who are sick of life, who are at war with society, 
who are supported in their anguish only by an unconquerable 
pride resembling that of Prometheus on the rock or of Satan in 
the burning marl, who can master their agonies by the force of 
their will, and who, to the last, defy the whole power of earth 
and heaven. He always described himself as a man of the same 
kind with his favourite creations, as a man whose heart had been 
withered, whose capacity for happiness was gone and could not 
be restored, but whose invincible spirit dared the worst that 
could befall him here or hereafter. 

How much of this morbid feeling sprang from an original dis- 
ease of the mind, how much from real misfortune, how much 
from the nervousness of dissipation, how much was fanciful, 



386 SELECTIONS. 

how much was merely affected, it is impossible for us, and 
would probably have been impossible for the most intimate 
friends of Lord Byron, to decide. Whether there ever existed, 
or can ever exist, a person answering to the description which 
he gave of himself may be doubted ; but that he was not 
such a person is beyond all doubt. It is ridiculous to imagine 
that a man whose mind was really imbued with scorn of 
his fellow-creatures would have published three or four books 
every year in order to tell them so; or that a man who could say 
with truth that he neither sought sympathy nor needed it would 
have admitted all Europe to hear his farewell to his wife, and 
his blessings on his child. In the second canto of Ohilde Harold, 
he tells us that he is insensible to fame and obloquy: 

" 111 may such contest now the spirit move, 
Which heeds nor keen reproof nor partial praise." 

Yet we know on the best evidence that, a day or two before he 
published these lines, he was greatly, indeed childishly, elated by 
the compliments paid to his maiden speech in the House of Lords. 

We are far, however, from thinking that his sadness was alto- 
gether feigned. He was naturally a man of great sensibility ; he 
had been ill educated ; his feelings had been early exposed to 
sharp trials ; he had been crossed in his boyish love ; he had 
been mortified by the failure of Ms first literary efforts; he was 
straitened in pecuniary circumstances ; he was unfortunate in 
his domestic relations ; the public treated him with cruel in- 
justice ; his health and spirits suffered from his dissipated habits 
of life ; he was, on the whole, an unhappy man. He early dis- 
covered that, by parading his unhappiness before the multitude, 
he produced an immense sensation. The world gave him every 
encouragement to talk about his mental sufferings. The interest 
which his first confessions excited induced him to affect much 
that he did not feel ; and the affectation probably reacted on his 
feelings. How far the character in which he exhibited himself 
was genuine, and how far theatrical, it would probably have 
puzzled himself to say. 

There can be no doubt that this remarkable man owed the vast 
influence which he exercised over his contemporaries at least as 
much to his gloomy egotism as to the real power of his poetry. 
We never could very clearly understand how it is that egotism, 



MACAU LAY. 387 

so unpopular in conversation, should be so popular in writing; or 
how it is that men who affect in their compositions qualities and 
feelings which they have not, impose so much more easily on 
their contemporaries than on posterity. The interest which the 
loves of Petrarch excited in his own time, and the pitying fond- 
ness with which half Europe looked upon Rousseau, are well 
known. To readers of our age, the love of Petrarch seems to 
have been love of that kind which breaks no hearts, and the 
sufferings of Rousseau to have deserved laughter rather than pity, 
to have been partly counterfeited, and partly the consequences of 
his own perverseness and vanity. 

What our grandchildren may think of the character of Lord 
Byrou, as exhibited in his poetry, we will not pretend to guess. 
It is certain, that the interest which he excited during his life is 
without a parallel in literary history. The feeling with which 
young readers of poetry regarded him can be conceived only by 
those who have experienced it. To people who are unacquainted 
with real calamity, ' ' nothing is so dainty sweet as lovely melan- 
choly. 1 ' This faint image of sorrow has in all ages been consid- 
ered by young gentlemen as an agreeable excitement. Old gen- 
tlemen and middle-aged gentlemen have so many real causes of 
sadness that they are rarely inclined ' ' to be as sad as night only 
for wantonness." Indeed they want the power almost as much as 
the inclination. We know very few persons engaged in active 
life who, even if they were to procure stools to be melancholy 
upon, and were to sit down with all the premeditation of Master 
Stephen, would be able to enjoy much of what somebody calls 
the " ecstacy of woe." 

Among that large class of young persons whose reading is 
almost entirely confined to works of imagination, the popularity 
of Lord Byron was unbounded. They bought pictures of him ; 
they treasured up the smallest relics of him ; they learned his 
poems by heart, and did their best to write like him, and to look 
like him. Many of them practised at the glass in the hope of 
catching the curl of the upper lip, and the scowl of the brow, 
which appear in some of his portraits. A few discarded their 
neckcloths in imitation of their great leader. For some years the 
Minerva press sent forth no novel without a mysterious, unhappy, 
Lara-like peer. The number of hopeful under-graduates and 



388 SELECTIONS. 

medical students who became things of dark imaginings, on 
whom the freshness of the heart ceased to fall like dew, whose 
passions had consumed themselves to dust, and to whom the re- 
lief of tears was denied, passes all calculation. This was not the 
worst. There was created in the minds of many of these enthu- 
siasts a pernicious and absurd association between intellectual 
power and moral depravity. From the poetry of Lord Byron 
they drew a system of ethics, compounded of misanthropy and 
voluptuousness, a system in which the two great commandments 
were, to hate your neighbour, and to love your neighbour's wife. 
This affectation has passed away; and a few more years will 
destroy whatever yet remains of that magical potency which 
once belonged to the name of Byron. To us he is still a man, 
young, noble, and unhappy. To our children he will be merely 
a writer ; and their impartial judgment will appoint his place 
among writers, without regard to his rank or to his private his- 
tory. That his poetry will undergo a severe sifting, that much 
of what has been admired by his contemporaries will be rejected 
as worthless, we have little doubt. But we have as little doubt, 
that, after the closest scrutiny, there will still remain much that 
can only perish with the English language. 



DICKENS. 

The essential elements of a novel are the conduct of the 
story and the development of character, neither of which 
can be shown in brief selections. The extract from Dickens 
which is here given will, however, serve to illustrate his 
humor, and will indicate his mode of treating character. 
It is a part of the chapter called Podsnappery, in Our 
Mutual Friend, The passage as it appears in this book is 
slightly abridged. 

Mr. Podsnap was well to do, and stood very high in Mr. Pod- 
snap's opinion. Beginning with a good inheritance, he had mar- 
ried a good inheritance, and had thriven exceedingly in the Marine; 
Insurance way, and was quite satisfied. He never could make 



DICKERS. 389 

out why everybody was not quite satisfied, and he felt conscious 
that he set a brilliant social example in being particularly well sat- 
isfied with most things, and, above all other things, with himself. 

Thus happily acquainted with his own merit and importance, 
Mr. Podsnap settled that whatever he put behind him he put out 
of existence. There was a dignified conclusiveness — not to add 
a grand convenience — in this way of getting rid of disagreeables, 
which had done much towards establishing Mr. Podsnap in his 
lofty place in Mr. Podsnap's satisfaction. ' ' I don't want to know 
about it ; I don't choose to discuss it ; I don't admit it ! " Mr. 
Podsnap had even acquired a peculiar flourish of his right arm 
in often clearing the world of its most difficult problems, by 
sweeping them behind him (and consequently sheer away) with 
those words and a flushed face. For they affronted him. 

Mr. Podsnap's world was not a very large world, morally ; no, 
not even geographically : seeing that although his business was 
sustained upon commerce with other countries, he considered 
other countries, with that important reservation, a mistake, and 
of their manners and customs would conclusively observe, ' ' Not 
English ! " when, Presto ! with a flourish of the arm, and a 
flush of the face, they were swept away. 

These may be said to have been the articles of a faith and school 
which the present chapter takes the liberty of calling, after its 
representative man, Podsnappery. They were confined within 
close bounds, as Mr. Podsnap's own head was confined by his 
shirt collar ; and they were enunciated with a sounding pomp 
that smacked of the creaking of Mr. Podsnap's own boots. 

There was a Miss Podsnap. And this young rocking-horse was 
being trained in her mother's art of prancing in a stately manner 
without ever getting on. But the high parental action was not 
yet imparted to her, and in truth she was but an under-sized 
damsel, with high shoulders, low spirits, chilled elbows, and a 
rasped surface of nose, who seemed to take occasional frosty 
peeps out of childhood into womanhood, and to shrink back 
again, overcome by her mother's head-dress and her father from 
head to foot — crushed by the mere dead- weight of Podsnappery. 
A certain institution in Mr. Podsnap's mind which he called " the 
young person " may be considered to have been embodied in Miss 
Podsnap, his daughter. 



390 SELECTIONS. 

The Podsnaps lived in a shady angle adjoining Portman Square. 
They were a kind of people certain to dwell in the shade, wher- 
ever they dwelt. Miss Podsnap's life had been, from her first 
appearance on this planet, altogether of a shady order ; for, Mr. 
Podsnap's young person was likely to get little good out of asso- 
ciation with other young persons, and had therefore been re- 
stricted to companionship with not very congenial older persons, 
and with massive furniture. Miss Podsnap's early views of life 
being principally derived from the reflections of it in her father's 
boots, and in the walnut and rosewood tables of the dim drawing- 
rooms, and in their swarthy giants of looking-glasses, were of a 
sombre cast ; and it was not wonderful that now, when she was 
on most days solemnly tooled through the Park by the side of her 
mother in a great tall custard-coloured phaeton, she showed above 
the apron of that vehicle like a dejected young person sitting up 
in bed to take a startled look at things in general, and very 
strongly desiring to get her head under the counterpane again. 

Said Mr. Podsnap to Mrs. Podsnap, ' ' Georgiana is almost 
eighteen." 

Said Mrs. Podsnap to Mr. Podsnap, assenting, "Almost 
eighteen." 

Said Mr. Podsnap then to Mrs. Podsnap, "Really I think we 
should have some people on Georgiana's birthday." 

Said Mrs. Podsnap then to Mr. Podsnap, ' ' Which will enable 
us to clear off all those people who are due." 

So it came to pass that Mr. and Mrs. Podsnap requested the 
honour of the company of seventeen friends of their souls at 
dinner, and that they substituted other friends of their souls 
for such of the seventeen original friends of their souls as deeply 
regretted that a prior engagement prevented their having the 
honour of dining with Mr. and Mrs. Podsnap, in pursuance of 
their kind invitation ; and that Mrs. Podsnap said of all these 
inconsolable personages, as she checked them off with a pencil in 
her list, ' ' Asked, at any rate, and got rid of ; " and that they 
successfully disposed of a good many friends of their souls in this 
way, and felt their consciences much lightened. 

Mr. and Mrs. Veneering, and Mr. and Mrs. Veneering's bran- 
new bride and bridegroom, were of the dinner company; but the 
Podsnap establishment had nothing else in common with the 



DICKERS. 391 

Veneerings. Mr. Podsnap could tolerate taste in a mushroom 
man who stood in need of that sort of thing, but was far above 
it himself. Hideous solidity was the characteristic of the Pod- 
snap plate. Everything was made to look as heavy as it could, 
and to take up as much room as possible. Everything said boast- 
fully, ' ' Here you have as much of me in my ugliness as if I were 
only lead ; but I am so many ounces of precious metal worth so 
much an ounce ; — wouldn't you like to melt me down ? " A cor- 
pulent straddling epergne, blotched all over it as if it had broken 
out in an eruption rather than been ornamented, delivered this 
address from an unsightly silver platform in the centre of the 
table. Four silver wine-coolers, each furnished with four star- 
ing heads, each head obtrusively carrying a big silver ring in each 
of its ears, conveyed the sentiment up and down the table, and 
handed it on to the pot-bellied silver salt-cellars. All the big 
silver spoons and forks widened the mouths of the company 
expressly for the purpose of thrusting the sentiment down their 
throats with every morsel they ate. 

The majority of the guests were like the plate, and included 
several heavy articles weighing ever so much. But there was a 
foreign gentleman among them : whom Mr. Podsnap had invited 
after much debate with himself — believing the whole European 
continent to be in mortal alliance against the young person — and 
there was a droll disposition, not only on the part of Mr. Pod- 
snap, but of everybody else, to treat him as if he were a child 
who was hard of hearing. 

As a delicate concession to this unfortunately -born foreigner, 
Mr. Podsnap, in receiving him, had presented his wife as "Madame 
Podsnap ; " also his daughter as "Mademoiselle Podsnap," with 
some inclination to add " ma fille," in which bold venture, how- 
ever, he checked himself. 

" How Do You Like London ? " Mr. Podsnap now inquired from 
his station of host, as if he were administering something in the 
nature of a powder or potion to the deaf child ; ' ' London, Londres, 
London ? " 

The foreign gentleman admired it. 

"You find it Very Large?" said Mr. Podsnap, spaciously. 

The foreign gentleman found it very large. 

"And Very Kich?" 



392 SELECTIOHS. 

The foreign gentleman found it, without doubt, enormement 
riche. 

" Enormously Rich, We Say," returned Mr. Podsnap, in a con- 
descending manner. ' ' Our English adverbs do Not terminate in 
Mong, and We Pronounce the 'ch' as if there were a 't' before 
it. We Say Hitch." 

"Reetch," remarked the foreign gentleman. 

"And Do You Find, Sir," pursued Mr. Podsnap, with dignity, 
" Many Evidences that Strike You, of our British Constitution 
in the Streets Of The World's Metropolis, London, Londres, 
London ? " 

The foreign gentleman begged to be pardoned, but did not 
altogether understand. 

"The Constitution Britannique," Mr. Podsnap explained, as if 
he were teaching in an infant school. ' ' We Say British, But You 
Say Britannique, You Know," (forgivingly, as if that were not 
his fault). "The Constitution, Sir." 

The foreign gentleman said, "Mais, yees ; I know eem." 

A youngish sallowish gentleman in spectacles, with a lumpy 
forehead, seated in a supplementary chair at a corner of the 
table, here caused a profound sensation by saying, in a raised 
voice, " Esker," and then stopping dead. 

" Mais oui," said the foreign gentleman, turning towards him. 
' ' Est-ce que ? Quoi done ? " 

But the gentleman with the lumpy forehead having for the 
time delivered himself of all that he found behind his lumps, 
spake for the time no more. 

"I Was Inquiring," said Mr. Podsnap, resuming the thread 
of his discourse, ' ' Whether You Have Observed in our Streets 
as We should say, Upon our Pavvy as You would say, any 
Tokens— " 

The foreign gentleman, with patient courtesy entreated pardon ; 
" But what was tokenz ? " 

" Marks," said Mr. Podsnap ; " Signs, you know, Appearances 
— Traces." 

" Ah ! of a Orse ? " inquired the foreign gentleman. 

"We call it Horse," said Mr. Podsnap, with forbearance. "In 
England, Angleterre, England, We Aspirate the 'H,' and We Say 
' Horse. ' Only our Lower Classes Say ' Orse ! " 



DICKENS. 393 

" Pardon," said the foreign gentleman ; " I am alwiz 
wrong ! " 

"Our Language," said Mr. Podsnap, with a gracious con- 
sciousness of being always right, "is Difficult. Ours is a 
Copious Language, and Trying to Strangers. I will not Pursue 
my Question." 

But the lumpy gentleman, unwilling to give it up, again madly 
said, "Esker," and again spake no more. 

"It merely referred," Mr. Podsnap explained, with a sense 
of meritorious proprietorship, "to Our Constitution, Sir. We 
Englishmen are Very Proud of our Constitution, Sir. It Was 
Bestowed Upon Us By Providence. No Other Country is so 
Favoured as This Country. " 

"And ozer countries ? " — the foreign gentleman was beginning, 
when Mr. Podsnap put him right again. 

' ' We do not say Ozer ; we say Other : the letters are ' T ' and 
' H ; ' You say Tay and Aish, You Know ; (still with clemency). 
The sound is ' th '— < th ! '" 

"And otliev countries," said the foreign gentleman. "They 
do how ? " 

" They do, Sir," returned Mr. Podsnap, gravely shaking his 
head; "they do — I am sorry to be obliged to say it — as they 
do." 

"It was a little particular of Providence," said the foreign 
gentleman, laughing ; " for the frontier is not large." 

"Undoubtedly," assented Mr. Podsnap; "But So it is. It 
was the Charter of the Land. This Island was Blest, Sir, to the 
Direct Exclusion of such Other Countries as — as there may 
happen to be. And if we were all Englishmen present, I would 
say," added Mr. Podsnap, looking round upon his compatriots, 
and sounding solemnly with his theme, "that there is in the 
Englishman a combination of qualities, a modesty, an inde- 
pendence, a responsibility, a repose, combined with an absence 
of everything calculated to call a blush into the cheek of a young 
person, which one w T ould seek in vain among the Nations of the 
Earth." 

Having delivered this little summary, Mr. Podsuap's face 
flushed as he thought of the remote possibility of its being at all 
qualified by any prejudiced citizen of any other country ; and, 



394 SELECTIONS. 

with his favourite right-arm flourish, he put the rest of Europe 
and the whole of Asia, Africa, and America nowhere. 

********* 

Mrs. Lammle was overjoyed to escape into a corner for a little 
quiet talk. 

It promised to be a very quiet talk, for Miss Podsnap replied in 
a flutter, " Oh ! Indeed, it's very kind of you, but I am afraid I 
don't talk." 

"Let us make a beginning," said the insinuating Mrs. Lammle, 
with her best smile. 

" Oh ! I'm afraid you'll find me very dull. But Ma talks ! " 

That was plainly to be seen, for Ma was talking then at her 
usual canter, with arched head and mane, opened eyes and 
nostrils. 

' ' Fond of reading perhaps ? " 

" Yes. At least I — don't mind that so much," returned Miss 
Podsnap. 

"M — m — m — m — music." So insinuating was Mrs. Lammle 
that she got half a dozen ms into the word before she got it out. 

' ' I haven't nerve to play even if I could. Ma plays. " 

(At exactly the same canter, and with a certain flourishing ap- 
pearance of doing something, Ma did, in fact, occasionally take a 
rock upon the instrument.) 

" Of course you like dancing ? " 

" Oh no, I don't," said Miss Podsnap. 

"No? With your youth and attractions? Truly, my dear, 
you surprise me ! " 

"I can't say," observed Miss Podsnap, after hesitating consid- 
erably, and stealing several timid looks at Mrs. Lammle's care- 
fully arranged face, " how I might have liked it if I had been a — 
you won't mention it, will you ? " 

"My dear ! Never !" 

' ' No, I am sure you won't. I can't say then how I should have 
liked it, if I had been a chimney-sweep on May-day." 

' ' Gracious ! " was the exclamation which amazement elicited 
from Mrs. Lammle. 

"There! I knew you'd wonder. But you won't mention it, 
will you ? " 

" Upon my word, my love," said Mrs. Lammle, " you make me 



DICKENS, 395 

ten times more desirous, now I talk to you, to know you well 
than I was when I sat over yonder looking at you. How I wish 
we could be real friends ! Try me as a real friend. Come ! 
Don't fancy me a frumpy old married woman, my dear ; I was 
married but the other day, you know ; I am dressed as a bride 
now, you see. About the chimney-sweeps ? " 

"Hush! Mall hear. 1 ' 

"She can't hear from where she sits." 

" Don't you be too sure of that," said Miss Podsnap, in a lower 
voice. " Well, what I mean is, that they seem to enjoy it." 

' ' And that perhaps you would have enjoyed it, if you had been 
one of them ? " 

Miss Podsnap nodded significantly. 

" Then you .don't enjoy it now ? " 

" How is it possible ?" said Miss Podsnap. "Oh it is such a 
dreadful thing ! If I was wicked enough — and strong enough — 
to kill anybody, it should be my partner." 

This was such an entirely new view of the Terpsichorean art as 
socially practised, that Mrs. Lammle looked at her young friend 
in some astonishment. 

" It sounds horrid, don't it ? " said Miss Podsnap, with a peni- 
tential face. 

Mrs. Lammle, not knowing very well what to answer, resolved 
herself into a look of smiling encouragement. 

"But it is, and it always has been," pursued Miss Podsnap, 
' ' such a trial to me ! I so dread being awful. And it is so 
awful ! No one knows what I suffered at Madame Sauteuse's, 
where I learnt to dance and make presentation-curtseys, and 
other dreadful things — or at least where they tried to teach me. 
Ma can do it. " 

"At any rate, my love," said Mrs. Lammle, soothingly, "that's 
over." 

"Yes, it's over," returned Miss Podsnap, "but there's nothing 
gained by that. It's worse here than at Madame Sauteuse's. Ma 
was there, and Ma's here ; but Pa wasn't there, and company 
wasn't there, and there were not real partners there. Oh there's 
Ma speaking to the man at the piano ! Oh there's Ma going up 
to somebody ! Oh I know she's going to bring him to me ! Oh 
please don't, please don't, please don't ! Oh keep away, keep 



396 SELECTIONS. 

away, keep away ! " These pious ejaculations Miss Podsnap 
uttered with her eyes closed, and her head leaning back against 
the wall. 

But the Ogre advanced under the pilotage of Ma, and Ma said, 
" Georgiana, Mr. Grompus," and the Ogre clutched his victim 
and bore her off to his castle in the top couple. 

And now, the grand chain riveted to the last link, the discreet 
automaton ceased, and the sixteen, two and two, took a walk 
among the furniture. And herein the unconsciousness of the 
Ogre Grrompus was pleasantly conspicuous ; for that complacent 
monster, believing that he was giving Miss Podsnap a treat, pro- 
longed to the utmost stretch of possibility a peripatetic account 
of an archery meeting ; while his victim, heading the procession 
of sixteen as it slowly circled about, like a revolving funeral, 
never raised her eyes except once to steal a glance at Mrs. Lammle, 
expressive of intense despair. 

At length the procession was dissolved by the violent arrival 
of a nutmeg, before which the drawing-room door bounced open 
as if it were a cannon-ball ; and while that fragrant article, dis- 
persed through several glasses of coloured warm water, was going 
the round of society, Miss Podsnap returned to her seat by her 
new friend. 

"Oh my goodness," said Miss Podsnap. "That's over! I 
hope you didn't look at me." 

"My dear, why not ? " 

" Oh I know all about myself," said Miss Podsnap. 

"Ill tell you something J know about you, my dear," returned 
Mrs. Lammle in her winning way, "and that is, you are most 
unnecessarily shy." 

" Oh there's Ma with somebody with a glass in his eye ! Oh I 
know she's going to bring him here ! Oh don't bring him, don't 
bring him ! Oh he'll be my partner with his glass in his eye ! Oh 
what shall I do ! " This time Georgiana accompanied her ejacu- 
lations with taps of her feet upon the floor, and was altogether 
in quite a desperate condition. But, there was no escape from 
the majestic Mrs. Podsnap's production of an ambling stranger, 
with one eye screwed up into extinction and the other framed 
and glazed, who, having looked down out of that organ, as if he 
descried Miss Podsnap at the bottom of some perpendicular shaft, 



THACKERAY. 397 

brought her to the surface, and ambled off with her. And then 
the eaptive at the piano played another " set," expressive of his 
mournful aspirations after freedom, and another sixteen went 
through the former melancholy motions, and the ambler took 
Miss Podsnap for a furniture walk, as if he had struck out an 
entirely original conception. 



THACKERAY. 

Ojst page 219 mention has been made of Thackeray's 
familiarity with the age of Queen Anne. Among the 
writers of that time, " honest Dick Steele," spite of all 
his faults, was Thackeray's acknowledged favorite. "I 
own to liking Dick Steele the man, and Dick Steele the 
author, much better than much better men and much 
better authors." Captain Steele of the Guards is a delight- 
ful character in Henry Esmond ; and in the English 
Humorists we find one of Thackeray's most charming 
papers devoted to his old favorite. The following extracts 
are from that essay. 

I am afraid no good report could be given by his masters and 
ushers of that thick-set, square- faced, black-eyed, soft-hearted 
little Irish boy. He was very idle. He was whipped deservedly 
a great number of times. Though he had very good parts of his 
own, he got other boys to do his lessons for him, and only took 
just as much trouble as should enable him to scuffle through his 
exercises, and by good fortune escape the flogging-block. One 
hundred and fifty years after, I have myself inspected, but only 
as an amateur, that instrument of righteous torture still existing, 
and in occasional use, in a secluded private apartment of the old 
Charterhouse School ; and have no doubt it is the very counter- 
part, if not the ancient and interesting machine itself, at which 
poor Dick Steele submitted himself to the tormentors. 

Besides being very kind, lazy, and good-natured, this boy went 
invariably into debt with the tart-woman ; ran out of bounds, 
and entered into pecuniary, or rather promissory, engagements 



398 SELECTIONS. 

with the neighbouring lollipop-vendors and piemen — exhibited an 
early fondness and capacity for drinking mum and sack, and bor- 
rowed from all his comrades who had money to lend. I have no 
sort of authority for the statements here made of Steele's early 
life ; but if the child is father of the man, the father of young 
Steele of Merton, who left Oxford without taking a degree, and 
entered the Life Guards — the father of Captain Steele of Lucas's 
Fusiliers, who got his company through the patronage of my Lord 
Cutts — the father of Mr. Steele the Commissioner of Stamps, the 
editor of the Gazette, the Tatler, and Spectator, the expelled 
Member of Parliament, and the author of the " Tender Husband " 
and the "Conscious Lovers;" if man and boy resembled each 
other, Dick Steele the schoolboy must have been one of the most 
generous, good-for-nothing, amiable little creatures that ever 
conjugated the verb tupto, I beat, tuptomai, I am whipped, in 
any school in Great Britain. 

Almost every gentleman who does me the honour to hear me 
will remember that the very greatest character which he has seen 
in the course of his life, and the person to whom he has looked 
up with the greatest wonder and reverence, was the head boy at 
his school. The schoolmaster himself hardly inspires such an 
awe. The head boy construes as well as the schoolmaster him- 
self. When he begins to speak the hall is hushed, and every little 
boy listens. He writes off copies of Latin verses as melodiously 
as Virgil. He is good-natured, and, his own masterpieces 
achieved, pours out other copies of verses for other boys with 
an astonishing ease and fluency ; the idle ones only trembling 
lest they should be discovered on giving in their exercises and 
whipped because their poems were too good. I have seen great 
men in my time, but never such a great one as that head boy of 
my childhood : we all thought he must be Prime Minister, and I 
was disappointed on meeting him in after life to find he was no 
more than six feet high. 

Dick Steele, the Charterhouse gownboy, contracted such an 
admiration in the years of his childhood, and retained it faith- 
fully through his life. Through the school and through the 
world, whithersoever his strange fortune led this erring, way- 
ward, affectionate creature, Joseph Addison was always his head 
boy. Addison wrote his exercises. Addison did his best themes. 



THACKERAY. 399 

He ran on Addison's messages ; fagged for him and blacked his 
shoes : to be in Joe's company was Dick's greatest pleasure ; and 
he took a sermon or a caning from his monitor with the most 
boundless reverence, acquiescence, and affection. 

********* 

Steele married twice ; and outlived his places, his schemes, his 
wife, his income, his health, and almost everything but his kind 
heart. That ceased to trouble him in 1729, when he died, worn 
out and almost forgotten by his contemporaries, in Wales, where 
he had the remnant of a property. 

Posterity has been kinder to this amiable creature ; all women 
especially are bound to be grateful to Steele, as he was the first of 
our writers who really seemed to admire and respect them. Con- 
greve the Great, who alludes to the low estimation in which 
women were held in Elizabeth's time, as a reason why the women 
of Shakespeare make so small figure in the poet's dialogues, 
though he can himself pay splendid compliments to women, yet 
looks on them as mere instruments of gallantry, and destined, 
like the most consummate fortifications, to fall, after a certain 
time, before the arts and bravery of the besieger, man. There is 
a letter of Swift's entitled ' ' Advice to a very Young Married 
Lady," which shows the Dean's opinion of the female society of 
his day, and that if he despised man he utterly scorned women 
too. No lady of our time could be treated by any man, were he 
ever so much a wit or Dean, in such a tone of insolent patronage 
and vulgar protection. In this performance, Swift hardly takes 
pains to hide his opinion that a woman is a fool : tells her to 
read books, as if reading was a novel accomplishment ; and in- 
forms her that "not one gentleman's daughter in a thousand has 
been brought to read or understand her own natural tongue." 
Addison laughs at women equally ; but, with the gentleness and 
politeness of his nature, smiles at them and watches them, as if 
they were harmless, half-witted, amusing, pretty creatures, only 
made to be men's playthings. It was Steele who first began to 
pay a manly homage to their goodness and understanding, as 
well as to their tenderness and beauty. In his comedies the 
heroes do not rant and rave about the divine beauties of Gloriana 
or Statira, as the characters were made to do in the chivalry 
romances and the high-flown dramas just going out of vogue ; 



400 SELECTIONS. 

but Steele admires women's virtue, acknowledges their sense, and 
adores their purity and beauty, with an ardour and strength 
which should win the goodwill of all women to their hearty and 
respectful champion. It is this ardour, this respect, this manli- 
ness, which makes his comedies so pleasant and their heroes such 
fine gentlemen. He paid the finest compliment to a woman that 
perhaps ever was offered. Of one woman, whom Congreve had 
also admired and celebrated, Steele says, that ' ' to have loved her 
was a liberal education. 11 "How often," he says, dedicating a 
volume to his wife, "how often has your tenderness removed 
pain from my sick head, how often anguish from my afflicted 
heart ! If there are such beings as guardian angels, they are 
thus employed. I cannot believe one of them to be more good in 
inclination, or more charming in form than my wife." His 
breast seems to warm and his eyes to kindle when he meets with 
a good and beautiful woman, and it is with his heart as well as 
with his hat that he salutes her. About children, and all that 
relates to home, he is not less tender, and more than once speaks 
in apology of what he calls his softness. He would have been 
nothing without that delightful weakness. It is that which gives 
his works their worth and his style its charm. It, like his life, is 
full of faults and careless blunders ; and redeemed, like that, by 
his sweet and compassionate nature. 

* ******* * 

The great charm of Steele's writing is its naturalness. He wrote 
so quickly and carelessly that he was forced to make the reader 
his confidant, and had not the time to deceive him. He had a 
small share of book-learning, but a vast acquaintance with the 
world. He had known men and taverns. He had lived with 
gownsmen, with troopers, with gentlemen ushers of the Court, 
with men and women of fashion ; with authors and wits, with 
the inmates of the spunging-houses, and with the frequenters of 
all the clubs and coffee-houses in the town. He was liked in all 
company because he liked it ; and you like to see his enjoyment 
as you like to see the glee of a boxful of children at the panto- 
mime. He was not of those lonely ones of the earth whose great- 
ness obliged them to be solitary ; on the contrary, he admired, I 
think, more than any man who ever wrote ; and full of hearty 
applause and sympathy, wins upon you by calling you to share 



GEORGE ELIOT. 401 

his delight and good humour. His laugh rings through the whole 
house. He must have been invaluable at a tragedy, and have 
cried as much as the most tender young lady in the boxes. He 
has a relish for beauty and goodness wherever he meets it. He 
admired Shakspeare affectionately, and more than any man of his 
time : and according to his generous expansive nature called 
upon all his company to like what he liked himself. He did not 
damn with faint praise : he was in the world and of it ; and his 
enjoyment of life presents the strangest contrast to Swift's savage 
indignation and Addison's lonely serenity. 



GEORGE ELIOT. 

The seventh chapter of Adam Bede allows the story to 
pause while George Eliot sets before us her theory of the 
novelist's art. This significant passage should be the 
introduction to a study of her works. In answer to those 
readers who prefer to find in novels something superior to 
every-day life, she writes as follows : 

But, my good friend, what will you do then with your fellow- 
parishioner who opposes your husband in the vestry ? — with 
your newly-appointed vicar, whose style of preaching you find 
painfully below that of his regretted predecessor ? — with the 
honest servant who worries your soul with her one failing ? — 
with your neighbor, Mrs. Green, who was really kind to you in 
your last illness, but has said several ill-natured things about 
you since your convalescence ? — nay, with your excellent hus- 
band himself, who has other irritating habits besides that of not 
wiping his shoes ? These fellow-mortals, every one, » must be 
accepted as they are ; you can neither straighten their noses, nor 
brighten their wit, nor rectify their dispositions ; and it is these 
people— among whom your life is passed— that it is needful you 
should tolerate, pity, and love ; it is these more or less ugly, 
stupid, inconsistent people, whose movements of goodness you 
should be able to admire — for whom you should cherish all pos- 
sible hopes, all possible patience, And I would not, even if I 



402 SELECTIONS. 

had the choice, be the clever novelist who could create a world 
so much better than this, in which we get up in the morning to 
do our daily work, that you would be likely to turn a harder, 
colder eye on the dusty streets and the common green fields — on 
the real breathing men and women, who can be chilled by your 
indifference or injured by your prejudice ; who can be cheered 
and helped onward by your fellow-feeling, your forbearance, 
your outspoken, brave justice. 

So I am content to tell my simple story, without trying to make 
things seem better than they were ; dreading nothing, indeed, 
but falsity, which, in spite of one's best efforts, there is reason 
to dread. Falsehood is so easy, truth so difficult. The pencil is 
conscious of a delightful facility in drawing a griffin — the longer 
the claws, and the larger the wings, the better ; but that mar- 
velous facility, which we mistook for genius, is apt to forsake us 
when we want to draw a real unexaggerated lion. Examine 
your words well, and you will find that even when you have no 
motive to be false, it is a very hard thing to say the exact truth, 
even about your own immediate feelings — much harder than to 
say something fine about them which is not the exact truth. 

It is for this rare, precious quality of truthfulness that I delight 
in many Dutch paintings, which lofty-minded people despise. I 
find a source of delicious sympathy in these faithful pictures of 
a monotonous homely existence, which has been the fate of so 
many more among my fellow-mortals than a life of pomp or of 
absolute indigence, of tragic suffering or of world-stirring actions. 
I turn without shrinking, from cloud-borne angels, from proph- 
ets, sibyls, and heroic warriors, to an old woman bending over 
her flower-pot, or eating her solitary dinner, while the noon-day 
light, softened, perhaps, by a screen of leaves, falls on her mob- 
cap, and just touches the rim of her spinning-wheel, and her 
stone jug, and all those cheap, common things which are the 
precious necessaries of life to her ; or I turn to that village wed- 
ding, kept between four brown walls, where an awkward bride- 
groom opens thedance with a high-shouldered, broad-faced bride, 
while elderly and middle-aged friends look on, with very irreg- 
ular noses and lips, and probably with quart pots in their hands, 
but with an expression of unmistakable contentment and good- 
will. " Foh ! " says my idealistic friend, " what vulgar details ! 



GEORGE ELIOT. 403 

What good is there in taking all these pains to give an exact like- 
ness of old women and clowns ? What a low phase of life ! what 
clumsy, ugly people ! " 

But, bless us, things may be loveable that are not altogether 
handsome, I hope ? I am not at all sure that the majority of the 
human race have not been ugly, and even among those "lords 
of their kind," the British, squat figures, ill-shapen nostrils, and 
dingy complexions, are not startling exceptions. Yet there is a 
great deal of family love among us. I have a friend or two 
whose class of features is such that the Apollo curl on the sum- 
mit of their brows would be decidedly trying ; yet, to my certain 
knowledge, tender hearts have beaten for them, and their minia- 
tures — flattering, but still not lovely — are kissed in secret by 
motherly lips. I have seen many an excellent matron, who could 
never in her best days have been handsome, and yet she had a 
packet of yellow love-letters in a private drawer, and sweet chil- 
dren showered kisses on her sallow cheeks. And I believe there 
have been plenty of young heroes, of middle stature and feeble 
beards, who have felt quite sure they could never love anything 
more insignificant than a Diana, and yet have found themselves 
in middle life happily settled with a wife who waddles. Yes ! 
thank God ; human feeling is like the mighty rivers that bless 
the earth ; it does not wait for beauty — it flows with resistless 
force, and brings beauty with it. 

All honor and reverence to the divine beauty of form ! Let us 
cultivate it to the utmost in men, women, and children — in our 
gardens and in our houses ; but let us love that other beauty, 
too, which lies in no secret of proportion, but in the secret of 
deep human sympathy. Paint us an angel, if you can, with a 
floating violet robe, and a face paled by the celestial light ; paint 
us yet oftener a Madonna, turning her mild face upward, and 
opening her arms to welcome the divine glory ; but do not impose 
on us any aesthetic rules which shall banish from the region of 
Art those old women scraping carrots with their work-worn 
hands, those heavy clowns taking holiday in a dingy pot-house — 
those rounded backs and stupid, weather-beaten faces that have 
bent over the spade and done the rough work of the world — those 
homes with their tin pans, their brown pitchers, their rough curs, 
and their clusters of onions. In this world there are so many of 



404 SELECTIONS. 

these common, coarse people, who have no picturesque senti- 
mental wretchedness ! It is so needful we should remember 
their existence, else we may happen to leave them quite out of 
our religion and philosophy, and frame lofty theories which only 
fit a world of extremes. Therefore let Art always remind us of 
them ; therefore let us always have men ready to give the loving 
pains of a life to the faithful representing of commonplace things 
— men who see beauty in these commonplace things, and delight 
in showing how kindly the light of heaven falls on them. There 
are few prophets in the world — few sublimely -beautiful women- 
few heroes. I can't afford to give all my love and reverence to 
such rarities ; I want a great deal of those feelings for my every- 
day fellow-men, especially for the few in the foreground of the 
great multitude, whose faces I know, whose hands I touch, for 
whom I have to make way with kindly courtesy. Neither are 
picturesque lazzaroni or romantic criminals half so frequent as 
your common laborer, who gets his own bread, and eats it vulgarly 
but creditably with his own pocket-knife. It is more needful 
that I should have a fiber of sympathy connecting me with that 
vulgar citizen who weighs out my sugar in a vilely-assorted cra- 
vat and waistcoat, than with the handsomest rascal in red scarf 
and green feathers ; more needful that my heart should swell 
with loving admiration at some trait of gentle goodness in the 
faulty people who sit at the same hearth with me, or in the cler- 
gyman of my own parish, who is, perhaps, rather too corpulent, 
and in other respects is not an Oberlin or a Tillotson, than at 
the deeds of heroes whom I shall never know except by hearsay, 
or at the sublimest abstract of all clerical graces that was ever 
conceived by an able novelist. 



THE RULERS OF ENGLAND 



The Norman Line. 



The Plantagenets. 



The Tudors. 

The Stuarts. 

The Stuarts after the 
Restoration. 

The House of Nassau. 

The Last of the Stuarts. 

The House of Brunswick. 



William the Conqueror, 1066—1087. 
William II. (Rufus), 1087—1100. 
Henry I., 1100—1135. 
Stephen of Blois, 1135—1154. 

Henry II., 1154—1189. 
Richard I., 1189—1199. 
John, 1199—1216. 
Henry III., 1216—1272. 
Edward I., 1272—1307. 
Edward II., 1307—1327. 
Edward III., 1327—1377. 
Richard II., 1377—1399. 
Henry IV., 1399—1413. 
Henry V., 1413—1422. 
Henry VI., 1422—1461. 
Edward IV., 1461—1483. 
Edward V., 1483. 
Richard III., 1483—1485. 

Henry VII., 1485—1509. 
Henry VIII., 1509—1547. 
Edward VI., 1547—1553. 
Mary, 1553—1558. 
L Elizabeth, 1558—1603. 

James I., 1603—1625. 
Charles I., 1625—1649. 

The Commonwealth, 1649—1660. 

Charles II., 1660—1685. 
James II., 1685—1688. 

William III., 1688—1702, 
and Mary, (died 1694). 

Anne, 1702—1714. 

George I., 1714—1727. 
George II., 1727—1760. 
George III., 1760—1820. 
George IV., 1820—1830. 
William IV., 1830-1837. 
Victoria, 1837— 



INDEX. 



A. 

Abbotsford, 181, 182. 
Abrabam and Isaac, 37. 
Absalom and Acbitopbel, 

94 
Adam Bede, 222, 401. 
Addison, Josepb, 26, 96, 

99, 100, 108, 112-122, 290, 

309. 
Adventures of Colonel 

Jack, 138. 
Aeneid, Dryden's Trans- 
lation, 99, 113, 275. 
Alcbemist, The, 59. 
Alexander's Feast, 97. 
Alfred, King, 14. 
All for Love, 99. 
All the Tear Round, 217. 
Amelia, 135. 
American Notes, 216. 
Amos Barton, 222. 
Ancient Mariner, The, 

197, 199. 
Andrews, Joseph, 134. 
Anglo-Saxon, 14. 
Anne Hathaway, 46. 
Anne, Queen. 26, 126. 
Annus Mirabilis, 93. 
Apparition of Mrs. Veal, 

The 139. 
Arbuthnot, Dr., 283, 318. 
Arcades, 73, 133. 
Arcadia, 133. 
Areopagitica, 75, 264. 
Ascham, Roger, 28. 
Assembly of Fowls, The, 

17. 
As You Like It, 49, 59. 
Atticus, 117. 
Augustan Age, 102-104. 
Aurora Leigh, 195. 
Austen, Jane, 214. 
Ayrshire Ploughman, 172. 



Bacon, Francis, 60, 62-70, 

133, 253. 
Bacon, Sir Nicholas, 63. 
Ballad Poetry, 178. 
Ballantynes, 182. 
Barnaby Rudge, 216. 
Battle of the Baltic, 195. 
Battle of the Books, The, 



Battle of Cheviot,The, 208. 
Battle of Otterburn, 178. 
Baxter, Richard, 87. 
Beaumont, Francis, 59, 

60. 
Beau Nash, Life of, 158. 
Bede, 14. 
Bee, 116. 
Beowulf, 14. 

Blenheim, Battle of, 113. 
Boccaccio, 18, 95. 
Boke of the Duchesse, 18. 
Bolingbroke, Viscount, 

107. 
Book of Martyrs, 89. 
Boswell, James, 90, 145, 

314, 382. 
Bride of Abydos, The, 

189 
Bridge of Sighs, The, 195. 
Brobdingnag, 131. 
Bronte, Charlotte, 215. 
Browne, Sir Thomas, 86. 
Browning, Elizabeth Bar- 
rett, 195. 
Bunyan, John, 86-91, 267. 
Burbage, James, 41. 
Burbage, Richard, 50. 
Burleigh, Lord, 65. 
Burke, Edmund, 145, 150- 

155, 321, 328. 
Burns, Robert, 26, 169-176, 

177, 201, 339. 
Butler, Samuel, 72. 
Byron, Lord, 109, 181, 187- 

196, 362, 384. 



Cadenus and Vanessa, 130. 
Caedmon, 14. 
Cain, 190, 193. 
Calvert, Paisley, 199. 
Cambridge, 16, 29, 63, 64, 

72, 73, 188, 198. 
Campaign, The, 114, 118, 

119. 
Campbell, Thomas, 195. 
Canterbury Tales, 19-21, 

22, 24, 31, 280. 
Captain Singleton, 138. 
Carlyle, Thomas, 208. 
Castle Rackrent, 214. 
Catiline, 59. 
Cato, 116, 117, 119. 



Cavalier, Memoirs of a, 

138. 

Caxton, William, 28. 

Caxtons, The, 215. 

Chapman, George, 44. 

Charlcote, 48. 

Charles I., 74, 75. 

Charles II., 75, 88, 90, 93. 

Chaucer, Geoffrey, 13-26, 
31, 58, 95, 99, 110, 112, 
113, 227, 278. 

Chester, 36, 38. 

Chettle, Henry, 46. 

Chevy Chase, 178. 

Childe Harold, 188, 189, 
191, 362, 363. 

Chillingworth, William, 
86. 

Chimes, The, 217. 

Christmas Carol, A, 217. 

Chronicle, Holinshed's, 53, 
62. 

Chronicle, Saxon, 14. 

Citizen of the World, 116, 
158. 

Clarendon, Earl of, 90, 
163. 

Clarissa Harlowe, 134. 

Cloister and the Hearth, 
The, 215. 

Coffee-house, Will's, 96. 

Coleridge, Samuel Tay- 
lor, 197. 

Collier, Jeremy, 98, 99. 

Comedy, First, 39. 

Compleat Angler, The, 90. 

Comus, 59, 73, 79, 80. 

Conciliation with Amer- 
ica, Speech on, 325. 

Conduct of the Allies, 125. 

Confessions of an Opium- 
eater, 198. 

Congreve, William, 98, 99, 
117. 

Corsair, The, 189. 

Cotter's Saturday Night, 
The, 171. 

Court of Love, The, 17. 

Cowlev, Abraham, 72, 95. 

Cowper, William, 170, 201. 

Cricket on the Hearth, 
The, 217. 

Criticism, Essay on, 103, 
105, 108. 

Cromwell, Oliver, 60,75,93. 



408 



INDEX. 



D. 

Daniel Deronda, 223. 
David Copperfield, 216, 217. 
Death of Dr. Swift, Verses 

on, 130. 
Decameron, 18. 
Defoe, Daniel, 133-139,303. 
De Quincey, Thomas, 198. 
Deserted Village, The, 

159, 160, 329. 
Dickens, Charles, 216-218, 

221, 388. 
Diodati, 73. 
Discoveries, 60. 
Doctor Faustus, 44. 
Don Juan, 190, 192. 
Donne, John, 72. 
Don Eoderick, 180. 
Drama, Rise of the, 35-44. 
Drama, Elizabethan, 60. 
Drama of the Restoration, 

98. 
Dramatic Companies, 

First, 41. 
Dramatists, Shakesperean, 

58. 
Drapier Letters, The, 126. 
Drummer, The, 114. 
Dryburgh Abbey, 182. 
Dryden, John, 72, 92-101, 

103, 104, 110, 112, 212, 

273, 312. 
Dryden, Address to, 113. 
Duchess of Malfy, The, 59. 
Dunciad, The, 103, 106, 

109, 110, 142. 



Early Theatres, 41. 

Ecclesiastical History, 14. 

Ecclesiastical Polity, 63. 

Edgeworth, Maria, 214. 

Edward n., 44. 

Edward V, Life of, 162. 

Elegy in a Country Church- 
yard, 170. 

Eliot, George, 203, 216, 
221-225, 401. 

Elizabeth, Queen, 28, 40, 
256. 

Elizabethan Drama, 60. 

Ellwood, Thomas, 84. 

Emblems, Quarles', 72. 

Emma, 214. 

Endymion, 195. 

England, Church of. 63. 

England, Worthies of, 86. 

English Bards and Scotch 
Reviewers, 188. 

English Humorists, 121, 
220. 

English Poets, Account of 
the Principal, 103, 113. 

Epistle of Eloisa to Abe- 
lard, 105. 

Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot, 
110. 



Essay on Criticism, 103, 
105, 108. 

Essay on Man, 106, 107. 

Essays, Bacon's, 68-70. 

Essays of Elia, 198. 

Essex, Earl of, 65. 

Eton College, 40. 

Europe, The State of, 64. 

Evans, Mary Ann, 221. 

Eve of St. Agnes, The, 
195. 

Every Man in His Hu- 
mour, 49. 

Excursion, The, 376. 



Faerie Queene, The, 29, 
30, 32-34, 68, 138, 236. 

Faithful Shepherd ess,The, 
59. 

Farquhar, George, 95. 

Felix Holt, 223. 

Ferrex and Porrex, 40. 

Fielding, Henry, 134, 135, 
136, 214. 

First Comedy, 39. 

First Dramatic Compa- 
nies, 41. 

First Tragedy, 39. 

Fletcher, John, 59, 60. 

Flower and the Leaf, The, 
17. 

Ford, John, 58. 

Four Georges, The, 220. 

Fox, John, 89. 

Fraser's Magazine, 219. 

Freeholder, The. 116. 

Fuller, Thomas, 86. 



Gad's Hill, 217. 

Gammer Gurton's Needle, ] 

40. 
Garrick, David, 145, 327, I 

328. 
Gay, John, 117. 
Gesta Romanorum, 53, 

54. 
Giaour, The, 189. 
Gibbon, Edward, 162-168, 

336. 
Globe Theatre, 42. 
Goldsmith, Oliver, 116, 

145, 156-161, 327. 
Gorboduc, 40, 41. 
Gower, John, 25. 
Grace Abounding to the 

Chief of Sinners, 88. 
Gray, Thomas, 160, 170. 
Great Plague in London, 

The, 138. 
Greene, Robert, 44, 46. 
Grey, Ladv Jane, 28. 
Griselda, i?, 21, 228. 
Groat's Worth of Wit, 

46. 
Grote, George, 208. 



Guardian, The, 116, 119. 
Gulliver's Travels, 127, 130, 
137, 295. 

H. 

Hallam, Henry, 20, 68, 208. 

Halliwell-Phillips, John, 
48. 

Hamlet, 41, 49, 50, 53, 56, 
57, 248-250. 

Harvey, Gabriel, 29. 

Hazlitt, William, 198. 

Hellenics, 195. 

Henry rv, 53. 

Henry V., 53. 

Henry VI., 54. 

Henry VOL, 52, 54. 

Henry Esmond, 219, 220. 

Herbert, George, 72. 

Herrick, Robert, 72. 

Highland Mary, 175. 

Hind and the Panther, 
The, 90. 

Historians of the Eight- 
eenth Century, 162. 

History of the Great Re- 
bellion, 90, 163. 

History of the World, 62, 
163. 

Hohenlinden, 195. 

Holinshed's Chronicle, 53, 
62, 162. 

Holy War, The, 90. 

Homer, 105, 109. 

Hood, Thomas, 195. 

Hooker, Richard, 62. 

Horton, 73, 74, 78. 

Hours of Idleness, 188, 191. 

Household Words, 217. 

House of Fame, The, 17. 

Houyhnhnms, 131. 

Hudibras, 72. 

Hugh of Lincoln, 21, 22. 

Hume, David, 163. 

Humorists, English, 121. 

Humphrey Clinker, 135. 

Hunt, Leigh, 195. 

Hymn on the Nativity, 73, 
76. 

Hyperion, 195. 

I. 

Idler, The, 116, 144. 

Iliad, The, 109. 

II Penseroso, 25, 73, 78, 

257. 
Imaginary Conversations, 

195. 
Immortality, An Ode on, 

202. 
Ireland, 30, 126, 127, 128. 
Ireland, A View of the 

State of, 30. 
Irish Melodies, 194. 
Irene, 143. 

Italy, Travels in, 114. 
Ivanhoe, 185. 



INDEX 



409 



James I., 66. 
Jane Eyre, 215, 219. 
Janet's Repentance, 222. 
Jeames's Diary, 219. 
Jeffrey, Francis, 87. 
Jew of Malta, The, 44. 
Johnson, Esther, 127. 
Johnson, Life of, 90, 145, 

314, 382. 
Johnson, Samuel, 60, 93, 

98, 103, 116, 121, 134, 140- 

149, 159, 309, 314-321. 
Jonson, Ben. 34, 44, 48, 52, 

59, 69, 98. 
Joseph Andrews, 134. 
Journal to Stella, 128. 
Juvenal, 95, 142. 

K. 

Keats, John, 195. 
Kenilworth, 356. 
King Lear, 50, 52, 53, 58. 
Knight of the Burning 

Pestle, The, 59. 
Kyd, Thomas, 44. 



Lady of Lyons, The, 215. 
Lady of the Lake, The, 

180, 183, 184, 348. 
Lagado, Academy of, 131. 
Lake Poets, 197. 
Lalla Rookh, 194. 
L'Allegro, 73, 78, 255. 
Lamartine, 81. 
Lamb, Charles, 198. 
Lament of Tasso, The, 189. 
Lamia, 195. 
Landor, Walter Savage, 

84, 195. 
Langland, William, 16. 
Laputa, 131. 
Lara, 189. 
Last Chronicle of Barset, 

The, 215. 
Last Days of Pompeii, 

The, 215. 
Last Rose of Summer, 

The, 194. 
Lay of the Last Minstrel, 

The, 180, 183. 
Lays of Ancient Rome, 

210. 
Leicester, Earl of, 29, 41. 
Lewes, George Henry, 222, 

223. 
Life of Nelson, 198. 
Lilliput, 131. 
Lives of the Poets, The, 

147, 309. 
London, 142. 

Lord of the Isles, The, 181. 
Lucrece, 52. 
Lucy, Sir Thomas, 48. 
Lycidas, 73, 80. 



Lydgate, John, 25. 
Lyly, John, 44. 
Lyrical Ballads, 199, 200. 
Lytton, Sir Edward Bul- 
wer, 215. 

M. 

Macaulay,Thomas Babing- 

ton, 67, 89, 207-213, 382. 
Macbeth, 53, 57, 58. 
Mac Flecknoe, 94. 
Magnificence, 39. 
Maid's Tragedy, The, 59. 
Manfred, 189, 193. 
Mansfield Park, 214. 
Marlborough, Duke of, 

113, 118, 119. 
Marlowe, Christopher, 44. 
Marmion, 180, 183, 188, 350. 
Martin Chuzzlewit, 217. 
Martyrs, Book of, 89. 
Mary in Heaven, 175. 
Masque of Queens, 60. 
Massinger, Philip, 59. 
Mazeppa. 190, iy2, 365. 
Medal, The, 94. 
Memoirs of a Cavalier, 138. 
Merchant of Venice, The, 

53, 55, 240-248. 
Meres, Francis, 47, 52. 
Michael, 203. 
Middlemarch, 223. 
Mill on the Floss, The, 222. 
Milman, Henry Hart, 208. 
Milton, John, 25, 56, 71-85, 

92, 99, 100, 120, 147, 255. 
Minstrelsy of the Scottish 

Border, The, 180. 
Miracle Plays, 35-38. 
Moll Flanders, 138. 
Montagu, Lady Mary 

Wortley, 107, 117. 
Moor Park, 125. 
Moore, Thomas, 194. 
Moralities, 39. 
More, Sir Thomas. 28, 133, 

162. 
Much Ado about Nothing, 

52, 54, 59. 
Mysteries, 35-38. 
Mysteries of Udolpho, 

The, 214. 

N. 

Nativity, Hymn on the, 

73, 7d. 
Newcomes, The, 220. 
New Place, 47. 
Newstead Abbey, 187. 
New Way to Pay Old 

Debts, A, 59. 
Nicholas Nickleby, 216. 
Noah's Flood, 35, 36. 
Norman Conquest, 24, 35. 
Normans, 14, 15, 23. 
Novum Organum, 68. 



O. 

Occleve, Thomas, 17, 24, 

25. 
Ode to Solitude, 105. 
Ode to the Pillory, 137. 
Oft in the Stilly Night, 194. 
Old Curiosity Shop, 216. 
Oliver Twist, 216. 
Othello, 50, 57. 
Our Mutual Friend, 388. 
Oxford, 113, 114, 141, 163. 

P. 
Pamela, 134. 
Pandosto, 133. 
Paradise Lost, 76, 77, 81- 

84, 120, 138, 259. 
Paradise Regained, 76, 82, 

84. 
Parisina, 192. 
Peele, George, 44. 
Pendennis, 219. 
Pepys, Samuel, 90. 
Percy, Bishop, 145, 178. 
Phil aster, 59. 

Pickwick Papers, The, 216. 
Piers Ploughman, The 

Vision of, 16. 
Pilgrim's Progress, 88-90, 

137, 267. 
Pleasures of Hope, The, 

195. 
Plutarch's Lives, 53. 
Poets' Corner, 16. 
Pope, Alexander, 96, 97, 

102-112, 117, 120, 170, 283, 

312. 
Prelude, The, 376. 
Pride and Prejudice, 214. 
Prior, Matthew, 117. 
Prisoner of Chillon, The, 

189, 192. 
Prometheus Unbound, 

195. 
Public Spirit of the 

Whigs, 125. 
Punch, 219. 

Q. 

Quarles, Francis, 72. 
Queen Anne, Age of, 102, 

112, 124. 
Queens, Masque of, 60. 



Radcliffe, Mrs. Ann, 214. 

Raleigh, Sir Walter, 30, 
32, 62. 

Ralph Royster Doyster, 40. 

Rambler, The, 116, 144. 

Rape of the Lock, The, 
105, 108, 109. 

Rasselas, 144. 

Reade, Charles, 215. 

Reflections on the Barrier 
Treaty, 125. 

Reflections on the Revo- 
lution in France, 153. 



410 



IXDEX 



Keformation, The, 15, 28, 
38. 

Regicide Peace, 153, 154 

Rehearsal, The, 97. 

Religio Laici, 94. 

Religio Medici, 86. 

Reliques of Ancient Poet- 
ry, 178, 180. 

Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 103, 
145, 329. 

Restoration, The, 60, 76, 
90, 94. 

Retaliation, 327. 

Richard II., 52. 

Richardson, Samuel, 134, 
158. 

Richelieu, 215. 

Rienzi, 215. 

Rime of Sir Thopas, The, 
16. 

Robertson, William, 163. 

Robinson Crusoe, 136, 137, 
138, 303. 

Roderick Random^ 135. 

Roger de Coverley, Sir,120. 

Rokeby, 181. 

Roman Empire, The De- 
cline and Fall of the, 
165-167, 336. 

Romance of the Forest, 
The, 214. 

Romeo and Juliet, 58. 

Romola, 223. 

Rosamond, 114. 

Roses, Wars of the, 52. 

Roxaua, 138. 

Rydal Mount, 200. 

S. 
Sackville, Thomas, 40. 
Saint's Everlasting Rest, 

The, 87. 
Salmasius, 75. 
Samson Agonistes, 76, 261. 
Saxon Chronicle, 14. 
Schoolmaster, The, 28. 
Scott, Sir Walter, 109, 177- 

186, 214, 348. 
Scenes from Clerical Life, 

222. 
Sejanus, 59. 
Sentimental Journey, A, 

135. 
Shakespeare, William, 42, 

44, 45-61, 68, 69, 98, 103, 

110, 113, 240, 282. 
Shakespeare's Early Con- 
temporaries, 43. 
Shakespeare's Songs, 250, 

251. 
Shakespeare's Sonnets, 50, 

251. 
Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 

194, 195. 
Shepherd's Calendar, The, 

29, 31. 
She Stoops to Conquer, 

159, 160. 



Shirley, 215. 

Short View of the Immo- 
rality and Profaneness 

of the English Stage, 

A. 98. 
Shortest Way with the 

Dissenters. The, 136. 
Sidney, Sir Philip, 29, 42. 
Sir Charles Grandison, 131. 
Silas Marner, 222. 
Silent Woman, The, 59. 
Skelton, John, 39. 
Sketches by Boz, 216. 
Skylark, To a, 195. 
Smollett, Tobias George, 

134, 135. 
Snob Papers, 219. 
Solemn Music, At a, 73, 77. 
Solitude, Ode to, 105. 
Song of the Shirt, 195. 
Southey, Robert, 198. 
Spectator, The, 116, 119, 

120, 144, 290. 
Spenser, Edmund, 25, 27, 

34, 68, 104, 113, 236. K 
State of Europe, The, 64. 
St. Cecilia's Day, A Song 

for, 97, 273. 
Steele, Richard, Sir, 113, 

114, 115, 117, 397. 
Stella, 127, 128. 
Sterne, Laurence, 134, 135, 

136. 
Stratford-upon-Avon, 41, 

45, 46, 47. 
Sublime and Beautiful, 

Essay on the, 151. 
Swift, Jonathan, 96, 107, 

117, 123-132, 295, 319. 

T. 

Tabard Inn, 19. 

Tale of a Tub, The, 125, 
129. 

Tamburlaine the Great, 44. 

Tarn O'Shanter, 175. 

Task, The, 170. 

Tatler, The, 114, 115, 116, 
119, 300. 

Taylor, Jeremy, 87. 

Temple, Sir William, 124, 
125, 127. 

Tennyson, Alfred, 201. 

Testament of Love, The, 
24. 

Thackeray, William Make- 
peace, 114, 120, 121, 135, 
216, 218-221, 397. 

Theatres, Early, 41. 

Thomson, James, 170. 

Thopas, Rime of Sir<17. 

Thrales, The, 146. 

Tintern Abbey, 199, 204. 

Tom Jones, 135. 

Tragedy, First, 39. 

Traveler, The, 158, 159, 160. 

Travels in Italy, 114. 

Triermain, 181. 



Trinity College, 124, 150. 
Tristram Shandy, 135. 
Trollope, Anthony, 215. 
Twickenham, 105, 106. 
Two Foscari, The, 190. 
Tyndale, William, 28. 

U. 
Udall, Nicholas, 40. 
Utopia, 28. 



Vanbrugh. Sir John, 98. 

Vanessa, 127, 128. 

Vanhomrigh, Hester, 128. 

Vanity Fair, 219, 220. 

Vanity of Human Wishes, 
The, 144. 

Venerable Bede, 14. 

Venus and Adonis, 51, 52. 

Verulam, Baron, 66. 

Vicar of Wakefield, The, 
157, 159, 161, 330. 

Victorian Age, 207. 

View of the State of Ire- 
land, A, 30. 

Villette, 215. 

Villiers, George, 97. 

Vindication of Natural 
Society, A, 151. 

Virgil, 95, 99, 113. 

Vision of Piers Plough- 
man, The, 16. 

Voltaire, 117. 

W. 
Waller, Edmund, 12, 104. 
Walpole, Horace, 106. 
Walsh, Thomas, 103. 
Walton, Isaac, 90. 
Warden, The, 215. 
Wars of the Roses, 52. 
Warwick. Countess of, 118. 
Warwickshire, 46. 
Waverley, 181, 1«5. 
Webster, John, 53. 
Werner, 190. 
Westminster Abbey, 16, 

31, 95, 147. 
West Wind, Ode to the, 

195. 
Will's Coffee House, 96. 
Windsor, 104. 
Woodcock, Katharine, 76. 
Woodstock, 182. 
Wordsworth, William, 26, 

81, 197-206, 374. 
World, The History of 

the, 62. 
Worthies of England, 86 
Wvcherlev, William, 98, 

99. 
Wyclif, John, 15, 28. 

Y. 

Yahoos. 131. 

Ye Mariners of England, 
195. 












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